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I have a sentence

There isn’t ------ egg on the table.

Should the gap have any or an? What's the difference?

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  • 2
    Do you mean a whole egg or a piece of one (cooked or uncooked)?
    – Shoe
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:02
  • 1
    What @Shoe said. Without that context, there is no question.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:21
  • [correction: Can you help me **with **x?]
    – Lambie
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:41
  • WIth all due respect, I think you need to go and find some English lessons, online or on tape. This is a very basic question and shows that your English is not even intermediate level.
    – Lambie
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:48
  • tks for your advice - Lambie - My teacher asked me to choose one of two anwers without the context.
    – Minh Đức
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 2:56

1 Answer 1

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I'm sorry Stockfish decided to pull his inspiring answer.

You may or may not expect many assorted eggs on the table. You may have been told that the table is where the egg was placed. Saying "There is not an egg" would be fine. If you had expected to find more than one egg then saying an egg would be a good way to emphasize your surprise. As would saying "There is not a single egg on that table".

If you were told that the table was covered in cooked/fried/scrambled etc. eggs then finding a clean table you could say "There isn't any egg on this table." Looking for a related food stain on your shirt you might say "There isn't any egg on my shirt".

"Egg" may be found as the singular in the shell or in the plural as the processed meal. As such it is not the best word to explore the a versus an question.

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  • I don't think my edit to the question has invalidated your answer, but this comment is merely to inform you of that possibility.
    – Andrew Leach
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:45
  • @A. Leach; Thanks for letting me know. Unless I am mistaken I think you removed parts of the question that helped with the context. Making a question shorter is not usually a proper way to edit a question.
    – Elliot
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:55
  • No: actually I added "What's the difference". Have a look at the edit history. There was no context at all.
    – Andrew Leach
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 16:57
  • Got it. Well done.
    – Elliot
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 17:18
  • tks so much both of you, My writing skill is so bad that I have to learn English everywhere.
    – Minh Đức
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 2:46

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