Talk:O for

RFD discussion: November 2019–September 2020

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O for

"Preposition" defined as a sentence, with a non-gloss supplemental definition: "I wish that I had; may there be granted; elliptically expressing desire or prayer."

It seems transparently O + for. DCDuring (talk) 16:20, 9 November 2019 (UTC)

I don't see how it is SoP. You can't say it without O, can you? You can't just say "for a horse"! — Note we also have oh for, but without this sense (!). Equinox ◑ 01:04, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Any idea what the etymology of the sports senses of oh for is? For the wish, there are also the variants O! for and Oh! for. Webster 1913 glosses O for as “would that I had; may there be granted; — elliptically expressing desire or prayer”. The collocation is not really a preposition in the grammatical sense.  --Lambiam 07:06, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Presumably "oh" means zero (as in phone numbers etc.). It reminds me of the cricketing phrase "X for Y" (X runs for Y wickets). Apparently "X for Y" means "X successes out of Y attempts" generally. Equinox ◑ 15:28, 10 November 2019 (UTC)

Grammatically, "O for" does not seem to me to be a single phrase or unit of meaning, yet, as Equinox points out, "O for X" does not seem to merely mean "O" + "for x". It is a bit of a puzzle. Mihia (talk) 00:12, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

• Anyone remember that song: Oh To Be In Love? --Vealhurl (talk) 21:43, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

Weak delete, since "ah for" ("Ah! for wings to soar") and "oh but for" ("Oh! but for a message from thee, dear love, Oh! but for a word, one word") and other variations exist. If we don't just view it as simple ellipsis of "I wish" prior to "for", and instead wanted to cover it somewhere, we could cover it in "for". - -sche (discuss) 20:07, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

• FYI, I have added a new sense at for:

Indicating something desired or anticipated.

O for the wings of a dove.

And now for a slap-up meal!

Mihia (talk) 15:12, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Redirected to the above-mentioned sense of for. - -sche (discuss) 01:10, 27 September 2020 (UTC)