J’ai failli signer le contrat sans lire la dernière page.

In this sentence, failli means almost or nearly.

So:

• J’ai failli signer = I almost signed

The verb is faillir, and in everyday French it is very commonly used in the pattern:

• avoir failli + infinitive

Examples:

• J’ai failli tomber. = I almost fell.
• Elle a failli oublier. = She almost forgot.

So J’ai failli signer le contrat literally means I have almost signed the contract, but in natural English we say I almost signed the contract.

Because faillir takes avoir as its auxiliary verb in compound tenses like the passé composé.

So the structure is:

• j’ai failli
• tu as failli
• il/elle a failli

not je suis failli.

Many French verbs use avoir in the passé composé, and faillir is one of them.

Because after faillir, French normally uses another verb in the infinitive.

Pattern:

• faillir + infinitive

So:

• J’ai failli signer = I almost signed
• Il a failli partir = He almost left
• Nous avons failli rater le train = We almost missed the train

This is similar to English almost + verb, but French expresses it with faillir + infinitive.

Yes. J’ai failli signer le contrat is already a complete sentence:

• J’ = I
• ai failli = almost did
• signer = sign
• le contrat = the contract

The part sans lire la dernière page simply adds extra information:

• without reading the last page

So the full sentence means that the speaker nearly signed the contract, and the extra phrase explains the circumstance.

After sans, French often uses the infinitive when the subject is the same as the subject of the main verb.

So:

• sans lire = without reading
• sans manger = without eating
• sans réfléchir = without thinking

In your sentence, the same person both almost signed and did not read, so French uses the infinitive:

• J’ai failli signer le contrat sans lire la dernière page.

French does not say sans lisant here.

A useful pattern to remember is:

• sans + infinitive = without + -ing

Examples:

• Il est parti sans dire au revoir. = He left without saying goodbye.
• Elle a répondu sans hésiter. = She answered without hesitating.

Both are possible, but they are slightly different in nuance.

• sans lire la dernière page = without reading the last page
• sans avoir lu la dernière page = without having read the last page

The first is the more straightforward, common way to say it. The second can sound a bit more explicit about the action being completed before the signing.

In many everyday contexts, French prefers the simpler sans + infinitive form, especially when the meaning is clear.

So your sentence sounds natural and idiomatic.

In French, nouns usually need an article much more often than in English.

So French says:

• signer le contrat = sign the contract

where English might sometimes omit an article in other contexts, but French usually does not.

Here le contrat refers to a specific contract, not just the general idea of contracts.

Because dernier usually comes before the noun when it means last in the sense of final in a sequence.

So:

• la dernière page = the last page

This adjective placement is normal and very common.

Compare:

• la dernière fois = the last time
• le dernier train = the last train
• les derniers jours = the last days

French adjective placement is not always the same as English, so this is something learners often need to memorize case by case.

Usually yes, in a sentence like this.

• la dernière page most naturally means the final page

However, dernier/dernière can sometimes have slightly different meanings depending on context. For example:

• la semaine dernière = last week
• le mois dernier = last month

In your sentence, though, la dernière page clearly means the final page of the contract.

It can, but learners should know that faillir is much more common in past contexts like j’ai failli...

For example:

• Je faillis tomber is literary or old-fashioned sounding in many contexts.
• J’ai failli tomber is the normal everyday way to say I almost fell.

You may also see:

• Il manque de tomber in some regional or stylistic contexts, but faillir is the standard verb to learn for almost with actions.

So for everyday French, avoir failli + infinitive is the key pattern.

A careful pronunciation would be approximately:

J’ai failli signer le contrat sans lire la dernière page.

Roughly: zhay fay-yee seen-yay luh kon-tra sahn leer lah der-nyair pahzh

A few useful notes:

• J’ai sounds like zhay
• failli sounds like fay-yee
• signer begins with the gn sound, like ny in canyon
• sans has a nasal vowel, so the n is not pronounced as a full n
• dernière has the ny sound too

Sometimes, but not in exactly the same way.

• J’ai failli signer le contrat is the normal idiomatic way to say I almost signed the contract.

Using presque directly before a conjugated verb is generally not the standard choice here:

• J’ai presque signé le contrat can exist, but it often suggests I practically signed it or I got very close to signing it, and it may feel slightly different in nuance.

For learners, the safest and most natural expression for almost did something is:

• avoir failli + infinitive

So:

• J’ai failli signer is the best model to remember.

The structure is:

• J’ = subject
• ai failli = passé composé of faillir
• signer le contrat = infinitive phrase, the action that almost happened
• sans lire la dernière page = additional phrase meaning without reading the last page

So you can think of it as:

Subject + avoir failli + infinitive + extra information

Other examples:

• Elle a failli tomber sans se rattraper.
• Nous avons failli partir sans fermer la porte.

This is a very useful model for building similar sentences.