# of his vs. of him



## tomtombp

In another thread my "every book of him" was corrected to "every book of his". Since it was made by natives, I accepted the correction, although I have always used "of him". However, the "of him" version still sounds better to me. I usually speak English based on my feelings of "what sounds better" (meaning I must have heard it many times), rather then stop to think about grammar in the middle of a sentence. This might not be the best way, but this makes me sound relatively fluent. Judging "of him" to be correct means I must have heard it many times. That pattern sounds too familiar to me not to be correct. Maybe it is used in a different structure. To find out how it is used, I started making a little Google research.
 My results:
1)I have found many hits for "book of him". Does that mean they are all incorrect?
2)There are way too many hits for "The other side of him" to be correct. If this is the same possessive form as "a book of him" why one is correct while the other is incorrect? Or are both incorrect?

Thanks


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## abda2405

There are a lot of threads on this...


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## tomtombp

Interesting. I've got 898 000 hits for "book of him" and 7 300 000 for "The other side of him". And I know that sometimes Goggle gives a false number at the first page so I clicked on further pages and the No. of hits remained the same. So we either live in two different parallel realities, or Goggle gives different hits in different countries.


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## srk

Try Google's Ngram Viewer, and compare the results for "book of him" and "book of his".

Also try British National Corpus and COCA.


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## abda2405

https://www.google.ru/webhp?sourcei..._qf.&bvm=bv.1355534169,d.bGE&biw=1536&bih=764. Show me at least one "book of him".
I found no "book of him"s in British National Corpus and one in COCA.


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## Chasint

You make some interesting points. As a native speaker I had not noticed this difference. However there is a difference.  I searched for "book of him" and found some examples. Here is an explanation:

To make it simpler to understand I will talk about a picture rather than a book. 

(a) Suppose that John owns a picture of a dog.
I could say *"I like that picture of his."*
(b) Suppose that John's parents have a picture of John.
His girlfriend could say *"I like that picture of him."*

"A picture of his" refers to a picture owned by John. "A picture of him" refers to a picture that depicts John.

Does this help?


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## PaulQ

tomtombp said:


> In another thread my "every book of him" was corrected to "every book of his".


It was properly corrected - "every book of him" is incorrect.





> However, the "of him" version still sounds better to me.


It sounds absolutely awful to me and all other native speakers - why not use "by him"?





> I usually speak English based on my feelings of "what sounds better" (meaning I must have heard it many times),


This must be the very worst way of learning English.





> this makes me sound relatively fluent.


Hmmm ... not if you say, "every book of him", it doesn't!





> Judging "of him" to be correct means I must have heard it many times.


Can you give us an example?





> That pattern sounds too familiar to me not to be correct.


So, what you are saying is "It must be right because it sounds right to me and I decide what is right?" This is circular logic.





> I started making a little Google research.
> My results:
> 1)I have found many hits for "book of him". Does that mean they are all incorrect?


Neither you nor I have seen them all, please give a few examples by native speakers?


> 2)There are way too many hits for "The other side of him" to be correct.


"The other side of him" is quite acceptable 





> If this is the same possessive form as "a book of him"


But it isn't, is it? "A book of him" is bad English for "his book". What about "a book of poetry."? "A book of questions." and "A book by Charles Dickens"? Why do we say "of questions." but "by Charles Dickens"?


> why one is correct while the other is incorrect?


Do you think that "every book of him" means, "every book written *by *him?"

Why do we use "by"?


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## abda2405

I got confused here in things I've already known... Thank you for making it all clear! I wish I had a teacher like you guys.


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> You make some interesting points. As a native speaker I had not noticed this difference. However there is a difference.  I searched for "book of him" and found some examples. Here is an explanation:
> 
> To make it simpler to understand I will talk about a picture rather than a book.
> 
> (a) Suppose that John owns a picture of a dog.
> I could say *"I like that picture of his."*
> (b) Suppose that John's parents have a picture of John.
> His girlfriend could say *"I like that picture of him."*
> 
> "A picture of his" refers to a picture owned by John. "A picture of him" refers to a picture that depicts John.
> 
> Does this help?



Thanks. I was aware of the second use and it's correctness so I checked the Goggle hits. Some of them are really used the second way but not all.


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## tomtombp

PaulQ said:


> This must be the very worst way of learning English.Hmmm ... not if you say, "every book of him", it doesn't!
> Why do we use "by"?



This is how native children learn how to speak. They don't use grammar books (before school) They just listen and the patterns they hear frequently got stored in their minds. Of course incorrectly used forms included.


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## Chasint

tomtombp said:


> Thanks. I was aware of the second use and it's correctness so I checked the Goggle hits. Some of them are really used the second way *but not all*.


Please give some specific examples of the "not all" or we cannot comment.


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## abda2405

I guess he means "Some of them really used the second way but not everyone" or something like this. Oh, it seems "some of them" already says that not everyone did it, right?


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> Please give some specific examples of the "not all" or we cannot comment.



There are quite a few, but as PalQ suggested, most or all of them are reviews made by non-natives and blogs written by non-natives. It seems to be a common mistake made by non-natives, including myself That's why the large number of Goggle hits.


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## abda2405

Tomtombp, Don't be sad, by making mistakes we learn.


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## tomtombp

PaulQ said:


> So, what you are saying is "It must be right because it sounds right to me and I decide what is right?" This is circular logic.


Of course I don't decide what is right I just choose the option that I think is more probably correct, based on how often I've heard it before.


PaulQ said:


> "A book of him" is bad English for "his book". What about "a book of poetry."? "A book of questions." and "A book by Charles Dickens"? Why do we say "of questions." but "by Charles Dickens"?





PaulQ said:


> Do you think that "every book of him" means, "every book written *by *him?"
> 
> Why do we use "by"?


Ok, I stand corrected. What confused me and the reason my mind recorded the "book of him" pattern is that it might be heard more frequently in Biffo's "picture of him" sense than in written by him "book of his" sense. In the latter case I think a "book (written) by him" or "his book", etc. is what is used.



PaulQ said:


> "The other side of him" is quite acceptable


That keeps me confused. Is the possessive form expressed by "of his" or "of him" then? Ok, aside with the book example because in that special case the author doesn't possess the book it was just written by him.


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## Parla

> OK, aside with from the book example because in that special case the author doesn't possess the book it was just written by him.


We _do_ say _his_ (or, in my case, _her_) book if that person is the author; it simply doesn't refer to a particular physical copy of the book but to the content (indeed, the author is the owner of the text under the principles of copyright; it's called _intellectual_ _property_). If a person owns a copy of a book, that copy is indeed his or her book.


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## tomtombp

Parla said:


> We _do_ say _his_ (or, in my case, _her_) book if that person is the author; it simply doesn't refer to a particular physical copy of the book but to the content (indeed, the author is the owner of the text under the principles of copyright; it's called _intellectual_ _property_). If a person owns a copy of a book, that copy is indeed his or her book.



Now I know that the book example is also a possessive case where "a book of his" is the correct expression. Why is "the other side of him" acceptable then?


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## Chasint

> Originally Posted by *PaulQ*
> 
> 
> "The other side of him" is quite acceptable
> 
> 
> 
> That keeps me confused. Is the possessive form expressed by "of his" or "of him" then? Ok, aside with the book example because in that special case the author doesn't possess the book it was just written by him.


I understand your confusion. The fact is that a physical object has sides but does not own those sides. 

Here's another set of examples:

_1. John bought a side of beef today. I am very hungry I would like to have that side of his.

2. John is sometimes happy and sometimes sad. I like the happy side of him.
_
_3. John got soup spilled on him. It was all over the left side of him._

______________________________________
Side of beef - half of a cow that has been butchered and prepared for sale.


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> _
> 2. John is sometimes happy and sometimes sad. I like the happy side of him.
> _
> _3. John got soup spilled on him. It was all over the left side of him._



Thanks, Biffo!

But it's "his happy side" and it's "his left" side in the examples above. Why is "of him" used then?



Biffo said:


> The fact is that an object with sides does not own those sides.


Does that mean it is not a possessive case? Why is "his side" used then?
How can I decide what is possessive and what's not? Should I always check if there's an ownership relation between the two persons or objects? This is something very strange to me and different from how possessive case is evaluated in Hungarian language.


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## PaulQ

"Is the book at the front of the radio?"
"No, it is on the other side of the radio/room/window."

"Is the book on/to his right?"
"No, it is on/to the other side of him." 

Here we are using "him" as a spatially relative object in the same way as we used "radio/room/window" We are saying "where" it is with respect to another object.

You should look on "the side/right/rear/front/left/top/bottom of" as a set phrase (followed by the objective case) rather than a possessive qualifier.

When we say "every book of his", *of *is indeed possessive, it does not locate the book, and therefore a possessive pronoun (possessive case) is required.

______________________

There is a *discredited *rule in English that says, "animate objects take the *genitive/possessive*; inanimate objects take *of*" e.g. "*His *leg", but "the leg *of the* table."

The rule was supported by your type of example: 
"No, it is on/to the other side *of John*." "No, it is on/to *John's (his) *other side." 
"No, it is on the other side of the radio/room/window."  "No, it is on the radio's other side." 

If you see this, not as a rule, but as a sort of guidance, it might help.


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## Chasint

tomtombp said:


> Thanks, Biffo!
> 
> But it's "his happy side" and it's "his left" side in the examples above. Why is "of him" used then?
> ...


The difference only occurs when 'him' or 'his' occurs after the noun. 

*Examples*

_"Here is a photo that belongs to John."
"I like his photo."
"Yes, I like John's photo."


"Here is a photo that I took of John when he was a child."
"I like his photo."
"Yes, I like John's photo."_

You can see that in the above examples there is an ambiguity in the responses. This is why we sometimes use the 'of' form. It removes the ambiguity.

*Compare with the following*

_"Here is a photo that belongs to John."
"I like this photo of his."
"Yes, I like this photo of John's."


"Here is a photo that I took of John when he was a child."
"I like this photo of John."
__"Yes, I like this photo of John."_

This time the ambiguity is gone.


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## tomtombp

Thanks, PalQ for your detailed reply. I learned something new today



PaulQ said:


> Here we are using "him" as a spatially relative object in the same way as we used "radio/room/window" We are saying "where" it is with respect to another object.
> 
> You should look on "the side/right/rear/front/left/top/bottom of" as a set phrase (followed by the objective case) rather than a possessive qualifier.



And what makes this even more complicated is that "side" is followed by the objective case not only when used literally (expressing a spatial position) but also when it's used figuratively (funny side of him).


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> The difference only occurs when 'him' or 'his' occurs after the noun.
> 
> Examples
> 
> "Here is a photo that belongs to John."
> "I like his photo."
> 
> "Here is a photo that I took of John when he was a child."
> "I like his photo."
> 
> You can see that in the above examples there is a possible ambiguity. This is why we sometimes use the 'of' form. It removes the ambiguity.



What I meant to ask was: why not "side of *his*" is used instead of "side of him" if "*his* side" is used


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## tomtombp

PaulQ said:


> "Is the book on/to his right?"
> "No, it is on/to the other side of him."






PaulQ said:


> There is a *discredited *rule in English that says, "animate objects take the *genitive/possessive*; inanimate objects take *of*" e.g. "*His *leg", but "the leg *of the* table."
> 
> The rule was supported by your type of example:
> "No, it is on/to the other side *of John*." "No, it is on/to *John's (his) *other side."



I'm getting totally confused. Are you saying that "No, it is on/to the other side of him." is correct while "No, it is on/to the other side *of John*." is not? The only difference is that "he" is used (in the objective case) instead of his name in the first one.


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## Chasint

tomtombp said:


> What I meant to ask was: why not "side of *his*" is used instead of "side of him" if "*his* side" is used


Sorry I edited my previous post to cover this. #21  Have another look where I show the difference in more detail.


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## Chasint

> There is a *discredited *rule in English that says, "animate objects take the *genitive/possessive*; inanimate objects take *of*" e.g. "*His *leg", but "the leg *of the* table."
> 
> The rule was supported by your type of example:
> "No, it is on/to the other side *of John*." "No, it is on/to *John's (his) *other side."






tomtombp said:


> I'm getting totally confused. Are you saying that "No, it is on/to the other side of him." is correct while"No, it is on/to the other side *of John*." is not? The only difference is that "he" is used (in the objective case) instead of his name in the first one.



I'm confused by this as well. In my opinion, the sentence does not provide support for the 'rule' so, in this rare case I think PaulQ has made an error.

In any case, given that it is a discredited rule, I'm not sure you should try to understand it!


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## wandle

In expressions such as 'This is a book of his', the word 'his' is possessive but the word 'of' is not.
In this case, 'of' is partitive: it means 'from among'. 

Thus the sentence means: 'This is one book from among his books'.


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## Chasint

wandle said:


> In expressions such as 'This is a book of his', the word 'his' is possessive but the word 'of' is not.
> In this case, 'of' is partitive: it means 'from among'.
> 
> Thus the sentence means: 'This is one book from among his books'.


That's a very good point. I agree except...

I feel the need for a more accurate phrase than 'from among'. Suppose he has only one book?


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## RM1(SS)

Then it would simply be "his book," not "a book of his."


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## Chasint

RM1(SS) said:


> Then it would simply be "his book," not "a book of his."


I did consider that point but how about this for a counter-example?

_"How do you get on with John's parents?"
"I like his father but I can't stand that dreadful mother of his."_

Clearly in this case John has only one mother but the expression is being used for emphasis. We could not say "among John's mothers" so it doesn't work in that case.


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## Man_from_India

"Other side of him" is correct, but not "the book of him".
But I am not sure about "other side of his", when talking about his character. I consider it to be incorrect as well.
But again "his other side" is correct, we can rephrase it as "other side of his".


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## SevenDays

Nouns typically have determiners in front of them to make clear what the nouns refer to. In _John's parents_, "John's" is the determiner of "parents" ("John's" _particularizes _"parents" in the discourse). You can't have two or more determiners, so if a determiner is already in place ("that" in "that dreadful mother"), the concept of "his mother" (where "his" functions as determiner) has to be expressed with the "of" construction: _that dreadful mother of his_. Similarly, in _a book of his_, the determiner "a" (which indicates _indefiniteness_) calls for "of his," and in _this is a book of his_, the determiner "a" requires "of his." Of course, we can drop "a" (_this is his book_), where "his" functions as determiner of "book." Whether there is one or more books becomes a semantic and not a syntactic analysis. In "the book of him," I suspect "him" is used for the same reason that the accusative is used by some as the subject of the gerund (_the book of him growing up in China_, instead of the _book of his growing up in China_): the accusative "him" is more emphatic; it places more emphasis on the "person" rather than on the activity of "growing up." But while "him" with an overt gerund might be acceptable in informal use, I'm not sure the same can be said of "the book of him." 
Cheers


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## wandle

Biffo said:


> I did consider that point but how about this for a counter-example?
> 
> _"How do you get on with John's parents?"
> "I like his father but I can't stand that dreadful mother of his."_
> 
> Clearly in this case John has only one mother but the expression is being used for emphasis. We could not say "among John's mothers" so it doesn't work in that case.



So it seems. This kind of example could also be extended to the case of a single book: 'He hit me with that book of his'.

My impression is that this kind of emphatic and distancing expression is parasitic upon normal partitive constructions.
It seems to be a joking, or at least ironical, adaptation of what is basically a plural idea to let us express rejection or distancing from something.
In fact, it could still be seen as partitive: 'that maternal relative from among his relatives', 'that literary possession from among his possessions'.


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## tomtombp

Thank you guys for all your comments. However, it's still not totally clear to me when to use "...of his" and "... of him" and "of  _name_ " and "of _name_'s". So I will sum up what I'm not sure of and what I have learned. Excuse my ignorance of grammatical terms, I will be using examples instead. My questions will be marked *bold.*

My original question #2 was: Why do we sometimes use " ... of his" other times " ... of him"

This applies to true possessives (there's an ownership relation) and some special cases that aren't 100% possessives but are either be considered possessives and used as if they were possessives or used specially as exemptions. And finally there are forms that are clearly not possessives.

1) We always say "his ..." regardless of what sense we mean to use it in, even if it's ambiguous, because that is the only option, none of "him ..." and "he ..." works, although in some dialect "me wife" is acceptable, but that's another story. Examples: "his dog", "his side", "his book", his photo".

2) If we want to use the ".... of his/him" form,

a) true (ownership) possessives are always expressed by ".... of his" - Clear.
     b) there are special cases like someone is in a photo or a book is written about someone, that are not possessives and therefore "... of him" is used. - This has always been clear to me.
     c) a book is written by someone is also a special case because the author doesn't own the book (he may have copies, but it's not relevant) but it was written by him. Here "... of his" is used as if it was a true possessive. - This wasn't clear to me, but now I learned it.
     d) there are other special cases that at the first glance seem true possessives but according to PalQ's post they are exemptions: they express spatial relations/positions. Examples are "side/right/rear/front/left/top/bottom". These are followed by "of him" instead "of his". - This I also learned.
     e) "side" is followed by "of him" even if it is used figuratively (happy side of him) - learned now.

*I wonder to what extent can this list be considered complete or are there any other exemptions where "... of him is used"?*

3) If names are used instead of "he" everything turns upside down:

a) In case of true possessives it's "... of John's" - This is clear.
     b) In case of a photo depicting someone it's " a photo of John"  and in case of a book about someone, it's "a book of John Lennon" - clear
     c) *A book is written by Hemingway is "a book of Ernest Hemingway" or "a book of Ernest Hemingway's"? Since "a book of his" is the correct usage, the latter one should be correct but I'm not sure. Or neither of them is used? (according to PaulQ's rule that says this form is not used for animate objects.)*
     d) In case of the spatial objects it's "on the other side of John"? - PaulQ marked this as incorrect because John is a person, so it should be "on John's other side". *Is it really incorrect? It doesn't sound bad to me and there are a lot of Google hits including many written by natives.*
     e) In case of "side" used figuratively, it's "the funny side of John"? *I find this correct too, is it?*

Sorry for being this long, but I wanted to cover all cases, Thank you in advance.


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## wandle

My advice would be to forget lists of rules for different cases. Instead, think in terms of function. 

The basic rule of function is: 'of' followed by a possessive (a book of Hemingway's) means 'from among' (see posts 27 and 33).

With this rule in mind, read good books and quality journals, observe how this expression is used and analyse it in this way each time you meet it. Ignore usage in blogs, e-mails and general internet chit-chat. Do not rely on any source other than high-quality material for examples of English usage.
You have to narrow your focus. Only rely on the best books, best newspapers, etc.


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## tomtombp

wandle said:


> The basic rule of function is: 'of' followed by a possessive (a book of Hemingway's) means 'from among'


Thanks, wandle. How about "from among all his sides" (happy side, funny  side, strict side, etc.). It is still "happy side of him".
Anyway, I think almost all of the few exemptions have been covered here, so I might not need any rules at all. Thank you though.


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## PaulQ

How about this… The simple explanation is that we say, *This is a book of his* but *This is a side of him* for reasons related to the early development of the language, and we make exceptions if it seems awkward.

*This is a book of his* is explained by this entry in the OED ->





> * 32.* Followed by a noun in the genitive case or a possessive pronoun. Originally partitive, but subsequently used instead of the simple possessive (of the possessor or author) where this would be awkward or ambiguous, or as equivalent to an appositive phrase; e.g. _this son of mine_ = this my son; _a dog of John's_ = a dog which is John's, a dog belonging to John. The early examples are capable of explanation as partitive, but in later use this is often not possible, and the construction may now be viewed as appositional (see further O. Jespersen _On Some Disputed Points in English Grammar_ (S.P.E. Tract No. XXV, 1926)).
> 
> [l]1870   J. R. Lowell _My Study Windows_ 2   It is positive rest to look into that garden of his.[/i]


*This is a side of him* is explained by this entry in the OED -> 





> 35 *a.* Belonging to a person or thing, as something that he, she, or it has or possesses (= the possessive genitive, and akin to the subjective, sense 15).In Old English always, in Middle English most frequently, and * in modern English preferably expressed by the genitive case (or a possessive adjective), except when for some reason this is difficult or awkward, *e.g.
> _1895   Law Times *100* 133/2   The widow of a man who had been killed at a level crossing._
> 
> *b.* Belonging to a person or thing as a quality or attribute. Also interchanging with the possessive, esp. when the object is a person, animal, or space of time, as ‘a month's salary’.
> 
> _a1616   Shakespeare Othello (1622) iv. i. 191   But yet the pitty of it Iago, the pitty._


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## wandle

tomtombp said:


> How about "from among all his sides" (happy side, funny  side, strict side, etc.). It is still "happy side of him".


Sorry, but I do not understand that. 

I have offered a functional explanation for 'of' followed by a possessive: for example, 'a book of Hemingway's', 'that mother of his', 'this idea of yours', etc. The meaning 'from among' applies to cases like these. I am not aware of any exceptions to this. 

The cases quoted by *PaulQ* from the OED as being appositional rather than partitive seem to me to be 'extended partitive', as suggested in post 33.
Thus 'this son of mine' means 'this filial relative from among my relatives' and 'a dog of John's' means 'a canine [possession] from among John's possessions'.


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## tomtombp

wandle said:


> Sorry, but I do not understand that.
> 
> I have offered a functional explanation for 'of' followed by a possessive: for example, 'a book of Hemingway's', 'that mother of his', 'this idea of yours', etc. The meaning 'from among' applies to cases like these. I am not aware of any exceptions to this.



"happy side of him" is followed by the objective case rather than possessive. The possessive case would be "happy side of his". Since it was agreed earlier that "happy side of him" is the correct one, that's an exemption for me even though it is a choice "from among his many sides". Sorry If I'm wrong somewhere or miss something, as I mentioned, I'm unfamiliar with most grammatical terms, like "extended partitive", etc... Thank you.


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## wandle

tomtombp said:


> "happy side of him" is followed by the objective case rather than possessive. The possessive case would be "happy side of his". Since it was agreed earlier that "happy side of him" is the correct one, that's an exemption for me even though it is a choice "from among his many sides". Sorry If I'm wrong somewhere or miss something, as I mentioned, I'm unfamiliar with most grammatical terms, like "extended partitive", etc... Thank you.


That is looking at it back to front, if I may say so.
I offer an explanation for phrases such as 'this book of John's'. 

How can we explain 'of' followed by the possessive 'John's'?
Answer: 'of' is partitive, 'John's' is possessive.

What does the statement " _'of' is partitive _" mean?
It means that the book is one book from among John's books: in other words, it is one of his books.
It is called 'partitive' because the one book is 'part' of the total of books or possessions.


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## Chasint

I too was unfamiliar with the term 'partitive' but I now agree largely with what wandle is saying. Here is my explanation:

If I say "I am one *of* John's friends." I am not stating that John's friends own me (perhaps as a slave! ). I am saying that I am included among John's friends. The 'of' in this sense does not indicate ownership, it indicates inclusion.

Does that help?


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## tomtombp

wandle said:


> It means that the book is one book from among John's books: in other words, it is one of his books.
> It is called 'partitive' because the one book is 'part' of the total of books or possessions.


wandle, thank you for your explanation of what partitive means.
What I don't understand is that, similarly to the book, "happy side" is also part of the total of his sides or in other words: one of his sides (although they are not possessed by him). Still, happy side "of him" or "of John" is the correct choise instead of happy side "of his" or "of John's". Maybe the key is the ownership as per Biffo's suggestion earlier?
Again, sorry if I'm still missing or misunderstanding something.


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## Chasint

tomtombp said:


> ...
> What I don't understand is that, similarly to the book, "happy side" is also part of the total of his sides or in other words: one of his sides (although they are not possessed by him)...


I think that 'side' can be considered a special case. It depends whether you take a side to belong to a person or to refer to a part of the environment that is defined relative to the person. I would accept either of the following:

_There are two sides of him that I don't like.

There are two sides of his that I don't like._

I prefer the first but I can't say that the second is incorrect.


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> I also was unfamiliar with the term 'partitive' but I now agree largely with what wandle is saying. Here is my explanation:
> 
> If I say "I am one *of* John's friends." I am not stating that John's friends own me (perhaps as a slave! ). I am saying that I am included among John's friends. The 'of' in this sense does not indicate ownership, it indicates inclusion.
> 
> Does that help?



This just further proves my "happy side" example, where his happy side is not owned by John, it's "just" part of his sides/belongs to his sides/included among John's sides!


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## tomtombp

Please, forget all other examples, let's just concentrate on my "happy side" example, which seems to me a clear exemption to wandle's rule.


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## wandle

tomtombp said:


> wandle, thank you for your explanation of what partitive means.
> What I don't understand is that, similarly to the book, "happy side" is also part of the total of his sides or in other words: one of his sides (although they are not possessed by him). Still, happy side "of him" or "of John" is the correct choise instead of happy side "of his" or "of John's". Maybe the key is the ownership as per PalQ's suggestion earlier?
> Again, sorry if I'm still missing or misunderstanding something.


I would not like to say that 'happy side of his' is impossible. 

Certainly, we would say things like 'Today, I saw the happy side of him'.
We could add, 'What a change from his gloomy side!'
Then someone might say, 'Oh, that gloomy side of his! It gives me the creeps.'

The other question is, how do we explain 'of' in 'the happy side of him'?
It seems to me this is either possessive, 'the happy side belonging to him' (which is odd, in that it is not separable from him), or derivative, meaning 'from him', the happy aspect we see as coming from him.

It is important to remember that 'of' has many different meanings: not just the possessive.


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## wandle

tomtombp said:


> Please, forget all other examples, let's just concentrate on my "happy side" example, which seems to me a clear exemption to wandle's rule.


First let me point out that the term you need here is 'exception' not 'exemption'.
(An exemption is generally a special permission granted to a person to free them from some obligation.)

Secondly, as mentioned in post 46, 'happy side of his' is not an impossible expression, though certainly less common than 'happy side of him'. The point to remember is that the two phrases have different meanings.


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## tomtombp

wandle said:


> The other question is, how do we explain 'of' in 'the happy side of him'?
> It seems to me this is either possessive, 'the happy side belonging to him' (which is odd, in that it is not separable from him), or derivative, meaning 'from him', the happy aspect we see as coming from him.
> It is important to remember that 'of' has many different meanings: not just the possessive.



Great point, wandle. I wanted to force possessive and was not even considering this.

How about "the left side of him"? I wonder what the role of "of" is in this case?



			
				wandle said:
			
		

> let me point out that the term you need here is 'exception' not 'exemption'.


Thank you very much for pointing this out. I have no idea why I used it all throughout this thread. I also know "exception", which is furthermore a much more basic word. Maybe "exemption to the rule" was just another pattern my mind has registered and I just used it in a wrong way or context.


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## Chasint

> How about "the left side of him"? I wonder what the role of "of" is in this case?


I think the problem is that it is impossible to give a categorical answer unless there is a context. (Such as wandle gave in #46 for 'happy side')

_________________________________________________________
_Note: Normally we talk about exemption from a rule._


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## tomtombp

Biffo said:


> I think the problem is that it is impossible to give a categorical answer unless there is a context. (Such as wandle gave in #46 for 'happy side')



Here I meant "side" (no politics) in the physical/spacial sense, like in: "There are two secretaries, one on each side of the  president, the minuting or elder secretary on the right, and the reading  secretary _on the left side of him_."
This is a sentence from "The Monthly Magazine, Or, British Register" by Richard Phillips, Volume 4., page 438. It seems an authentic source.



Biffo said:


> _Note: Normally we talk about exemption from a rule._



Thanks, my mind must have combined two expressions resulting in a totally incorrect one then


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## Chasint

tomtombp said:


> Here I meant "side" (no politics) in the physical/spacial sense, like in: "There are two secretaries, one on each side of the  president, the minuting or elder secretary on the right, and the reading  secretary _on the left side of him_."
> This is a sentence from "The Monthly Magazine, Or, British Register" by Richard Phillips, page 438. It seems an authentic source.
> ...


In that case I would say it is not a possessive. You could replace 'of' with 'relative to'.

"... and the reading secretary _on the left side relative to him_."


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## tomtombp

tomtombp said:


> Here I meant "side" (no politics) in the physical/spacial sense, like in: "There are two secretaries, one on each side of the  president, the minuting or elder secretary on the right, and the reading  secretary _on the left side of him_."


I think I could guess this myself. Here "of" means "to" or "from". On the left to him, on the left from him. Am I right?

What about "The left side of him looks better in that photo than his right side."?

I was cross-posting with Biffo, I'm just much slower More exactly I was editing my previous post, looking for the Volume No. when he posted his reply


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## tomtombp

tomtombp said:


> What about "The left side of him looks better in that photo than his right side."?



I know it's hard to take a photo where both *sides of him* can be seen, so let's leave "in that photo" off.

The same question for the sentence above. What is the role of "of"?


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## PaulQ

of = belonging to, it is a preposition.


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## JuanEscritor

This might have been said, but here it is:

_of + possessive_ = owned/authored
_of + object_ = contains (only pronouns get marked for this case)
_on_ + object = is about (only pronouns get marked for this case)

_That book of John's is full of nonsense._ = The book John owns/authored is full of nonsense.
_That book on John is full of nonsense. _= The book about John is full of nonsense. 

_That book of his is full of nonsense._ = The book he owns/authored is full of nonsense.
_That book on him is full of nonsense._ = The book about him is full of nonsense.

_That picture of his is awful._ = The picture he owns/took is awful.
_That picture of him is awful._ = The picture containing his image is awful.

The only exceptions I can think of to these standards are fixed expressions or titles (e.g.: _Book of John_ = the fourth gospel of the canonical New Testament and _Book of John's_ is not an appropriate title for the text; or _nicer side of him_ which is fixed, as the identically-meaning _nicer  side of his_ proves--_I really like that nicer side of his _vs. _I really like the nicer side of him_.)

Enjoy.

JE


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## SevenDays

tomtombp said:


> I know it's hard to take a photo where both *sides of him* can be seen, so let's leave "in that photo" off.
> 
> The same question for the sentence above. What is the role of "of"?



The preposition "of" allows the pronoun "him" to be a _complement_ (_to modify)_ the noun "sides;" in other words, "him," by virtue of the preposition, functions like a post-noun adjective, something which lexical adjectives rarely do. "Him" has a semantic role: it focuses attention on the person that it represents.
Cheers


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## tomtombp

I'd like to thank you guys for your time and patience. Sorry for being so ignorant. Thank you for all your posts trying to help me.


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