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Tarirotari Posted 16 years ago
Grammar

We tried to forget all/everything

Hi,

Is the following sentence correct: "We tried to forget all". It sounds weird and it's probably wrong, but if it is, why?

Any ideas?

Thanks.
  

Top answer

Not 100% sure but I think We tried to forget everything. We tried to forget it all. We tried to forget all of them.

— Ivanhr

  • Not 100% sure but I think We tried to forget everything.
  • We tried to forget it all.
  • We tried to forget all of them.
  • it seems that when used as the object of a verb, all can't be used alone.
  • But at the beginning of a sentence all can be used alone.
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2 Answers
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Not 100% sure but I think

We tried to forget everything.

We tried to forget it all.

We tried to forget all of them.

it seems that when used as the object of a verb, all can't be used alone.

But at the beginning of a sentence all can be used alone.

All is fair in love and war.
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tarirotari"We tried to forget all".
The sentence is correct but ambiguous. All may mean everything or everybody. This use of all isn't very common and may sound odd because of that.

CB
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