"give wide berth" vs. "give a wide berth"

[Torsten]

Hi,

It seems that the idiom "give someone a wide berth" is usually used with the indefinite article. However, I've also seen sentences with the expression "give somebody wide berth". Does this mean that both expressions are correct? (give somebody a wide berth and give somebody wide berth).

Hope you won't give me a wide berth because of my question.
Thanks,
Torsten

TOEIC listening, photographs: An airline cockpit

[Alan]

Hi Torsten,

I only know 'a wide berth' but it has become a fashion nowadays to drop the article when the noun is qualified. So people say: It's lovely day today, isn't it? This of course is heard only in the confines of the small island in which I live. I think I mentioned this before in a previous post some time ago and metaphorical eyebrows were raised at my comment by some of our American contributors.

Alan
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English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Present Simple

[Tom]

Hi

Yes, I remember that discussion.

It's here.

http://www.english-test.net/forum/ftopic12190.html

Tom

[Yankee]

.
A BNC search turned up only one single example of "wide berth" without an indefinite article:
Europeans give Doyle wide berth at Phoenix

However, that looks suspiciously as if it might have been a headline -- and "headline English" regularly omits things such as articles. :wink:
.
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"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." ~ Abraham Lincoln

[Lost_Soul]