ぶり
- 1For the first time in a given length of time, after an interval in which the action or event did not occur.Ex. 2
- 2For the first time since a given past event, with nothing of the kind happening in between.Ex. 1
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Used in both speech and writing to mark a reunion, return, or recurrence after an interval, as in 久しぶり. It is common in everyday talk and in news or sports reports, where short intervals like 5分ぶり also appear. Unlike まえ, which simply places an event in the past, ぶり measures the gap until something happens again.
Do not equate 5年ぶりに会った with 5年前に会った; the first means meeting again after five years, not meeting five years ago.
Note that ぶり implies the action did not happen at all during the stated interval.
Learners should use に before a verb (5年ぶりに帰った) and の before a noun (5年ぶりの帰省), not the other way round.
- ぶりにN3「ぶりに」 is simply the interval sense of 「ぶり」 (it can also attach to event nouns, e.g., 「卒業ぶりに」); to modify a noun use 「ぶりの」, and as a predicate use 「ぶりだ」. Uses like 「仕事ぶり」, which describe how someone does something, are unrelated to 「ぶりに」.
- たばかりN4In its interval sense, 「ぶり」 emphasizes that something happens again only after a long time, and it attaches to nouns expressing a length of time or event nouns; 「たばかり」 attaches to the た-form of a verb and stresses that the action has just been completed and little time has passed. The two cannot be interchanged, and the appearance sense of 「ぶり」 is unrelated here.
- ふうにN2「ふうに」 is close only to the appearance sense of 「ぶり」. 「ぶり」 attaches to nouns or the ます-stem to form a noun, often with an evaluative nuance, while 「ふうに」 attaches to 「こんな」, verbs, and the like to describe how an action is done; the two cannot be interchanged.
- たびにN3「たびに」 indicates that whenever a recurring event happens, the following clause occurs with it each time; 「ぶり」 indicates that something happens again only after a certain interval (or since a certain event), focusing on how long the gap was. 「たびに」 attaches to the dictionary form of a verb or to 「名詞＋の」, and the two cannot be interchanged.
- ごろN5「ごろ」 attaches to a point in time and indicates an approximate time (「7時ごろ」 = 'around seven o'clock'); in its interval sense, 「ぶり」 attaches to a length of time or an event noun and indicates how long it has been since something last happened (「5年ぶり」 = 'for the first time in five years'). The two cannot be interchanged.
ぶりに is simply the adverbial form of ぶり, and たばかり means something has only just happened, whereas ぶり marks that something happens again after an interval. ふうに describes a manner, たびに means 'every time', and ごろ gives an approximate point in time rather than an interval.
