Talk:O for

Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word Talk:O for. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word Talk:O for, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say Talk:O for in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word Talk:O for you have here. The definition of the word Talk:O for will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofTalk:O for, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.

RFD discussion: November 2019–September 2020

Latest comment: 4 years ago9 comments6 people in discussion

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion (permalink).

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

"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)Reply

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


Wikious
Boobota
Sagapedia