Is "of" necessary?

Sandi LeFaucheur

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Which is better?

All of my maiden aunts have green hair.
All my maiden aunts have green hair.

Not sure if the "of" belongs or not. Is one better grammatically than the other? Is this a which-side-of-the-Atlantic-are-you issue?

Many thanks.
 

Ludka

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Hmmmm...

Either seems perfectly acceptable to me. However, going with the hard-and-fast rule of "omit the superfluous," I would rid myself of the "of". If you can say it without and still make sense, you don't need it.
 

semilargeintestine

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Seems pretty superfluous to me.

ETA: Beat me to it. I'd get rid of it. It makes it sound clunky.
 

Prawn

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Can you really boo-ya grammar?
 

ComicBent

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Just for the record

Either "all" or "all of" is perfectly correct.

The notion of eliminating the superfluous is a guide, not a rule. Sentence rhythm is also important.
 

Tsu Dho Nimh

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Which is better?

All of my maiden aunts have green hair.
All my maiden aunts have green hair.

Not sure if the "of" belongs or not. Is one better grammatically than the other? Is this a which-side-of-the-Atlantic-are-you issue?

Many thanks.

It's not wrong to omit it, but for some audiences, it is best to leave it in. If you are writing for low reading skill audiences, for translation, or global audiences, they need every sentence structure clue you can give them.
 

PVish

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Which is better?

All of my maiden aunts have green hair.
All my maiden aunts have green hair.

I'll vote for the second sentence, but sometimes using the "of" is better when dealing with a sentence like this:
All of them have green hair.

Leaving out the "of"—All them have green hair—doesn't sound right. They all have green hair works, though.

My maiden aunts all have green hair sounds pretty good, too.
 

Grebbsy

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Which is better?

All of my maiden aunts have green hair.
All my maiden aunts have green hair.

Not sure if the "of" belongs or not.

Neither is incorrect, so you must decide which fits your context better. Leaving out 'of' gives it a certain extra speed. (Mott the Hoople didn't have a hit with 'All of the Young Dudes', did they?)
 

Millicent M'Lady

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Neither is incorrect, so you must decide which fits your context better. Leaving out 'of' gives it a certain extra speed. (Mott the Hoople didn't have a hit with 'All of the Young Dudes', did they?)

I'd agree with this. It largely depends on the formality of the text. I don't think it's superfluous to include it. The only omission of "of" that really bugs me is one which Chuck Palahniuk does a lot- "couple days", "couple people" etc. Really irritates me. It sounds lazy.
 

motormind

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Hmmmm...

Either seems perfectly acceptable to me. However, going with the hard-and-fast rule of "omit the superfluous," I would rid myself of the "of". If you can say it without and still make sense, you don't need it.

If it's part of dialogue, I'd probably keep it in. It also depends on how this this sentence flows within context. Just read your text aloud to make sure it sounds right.
 

unicornjam

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Both are correct. I like my writing to be more formal, so I would retain the "of."
 

frimble3

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Just don't make a fetish of it. If you scrub out every 'of', regardless of the sound of the line, it will become noticeable. In dialogue, it could come of as some sort of an accent or dialect. In a whole book, it would sound like one of those stunts, like writing a book without any use of a particular vowel, etc.