I read that the preposition "of" is used to show possession, belonging, or origin. For example:
a friend of mine
employees of the company
a habit of mine
the love of a good woman
I hear the bark of a puppy.
I understand some but sometimes I don't understand well how to use article (a,the) before or after "of".
For example.
a habit of mine
Can I say "the habit of mine "?
the love of a good woman
Can I say "the love of the good woman "?
Could you please tell me the different meanings of those sentences if I change articles?
Best Answer
While you could use both "a" and "the" in your examples, it's much more common to use "of" in the indefinite case.
When using a:
You're talking about no particular item, but one among a bunch of others. the "of"-part serves as reducing the size of that bunch.
When using the:
You're already talking about a very distinct subset (namely one occurrence) and other ways of showing that are available.