gå i kvav

Swedish

Etymology

Roughly, "go in suffocation." Perhaps related to an obsolete sense of kvav as deep water, depths of the sea.

Verb

gå i kvav (present går i kvav, preterite gick i kvav, supine gått i kvav, imperative gå i kvav)

  1. to go down (sink)
    Synonyms: gå under, förlisa, sjunka
    • 1970, “Kalle Teodor”, Astrid Lindgren (lyrics), Georg Riedel (music)‎[1]:
      I storm på Biskaya gick skeppet i kvav, skeppet han segla' [seglade], Kalle Teodor, och därför så vilar han nu i sin grav, vaggad av sjögräs, Kalle Teodor. Men en stormnatt kan du höra nån som ropar: Hej hå! Ifrån havets djup det kommer, och det låter så: Hej hå! Hej hå!
      In stormy weather in Biscay, the ship went down, the ship he was sailing, Kalle Teodor, and therefore he now rests in his grave, cradled ["rocked" (like in a cradle), but works as a translation] by seaweed, Kalle Teodor. But on a stormy night you can hear someone calling: Hey ho! From the ocean depths ["the sea's depth(s)" – intuitively "depth," though the plural is identical – singular is idiomatic in "dras ner i djupet" (be pulled into the depths [depth]), for example] it comes, and it sounds like that: Hey ho! Hey ho! [Or "and it sounds like so," but that is an idiomatic way of saying "and it sounds like that," whereas "and it sounds like this" would normally be put as "och det låter så här." The official lyrics have a colon.]
  2. (figuratively) to founder, to go under (collapse, fail, or the like)
    ett förhållande dömt att gå i kvav
    a relationship doomed to founder

See also

References

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