- Jim’s apartment is always in a mess.
- His office is a mess.
Do I have to put the preposition “in” in front of “a mess”?
Thank you!!!
No, I’m pretty sure it is optional. Trying to think of what the distinction is, I can’t come up with any examples where one version would definitely be right and the other version wrong, but I think that the plain ‘a mess’ version is maybe slight stronger - like ‘his office is in a mess, but it will only take five minutes to tidy up’, versus ‘his office is a mess - he never tidies it, and it will be a day’s work to get it looking clean’. But realistically, neither version would be wrong in either of those examples.
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No. Both usages are practically identical.
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For me, I’ve never heard about a “thing” being “IN” a mess, only a person. And in those situations, the mess is something other than an actual physical mess.
For example:
- Do you have $1,000 to help cover Jim’s gambling debt? He is in a big mess and needs help getting out.
–In this situation, “the mess” is the mobster that he ticked off by putting up money he did not have. it’s a bad situation Jim is in the middle of.
- Jim lost all his money betting on horses that didn’t win. He can’t afford to pay his cleaning lady and that’s why his apartment is always a mess.
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That’s a good point about ‘in a mess’ being the correct version when referring to a set of circumstances, rather than a physical object or place (although that’s when you’re not talking about the person directly, rather than the situation that they are in - you could still say something like ‘his personal circumstances are a mess’ or ‘his personal circumstances are in a mess’). But the two versions both sound correct to me when used of something physical. ‘My hair is a mess’ / ‘My hair in in a mess’ - both of those sound valid to my ear.
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