The usual rule says an goes before a vowel letter, one of a, e, i, o and u. On the 493 printed lines where the dictionary, a book that lists the words of a language, can say how the next word begins, that rule is right 486 times. A rule about the first sound of the next word is right on all 493. The seven lines that separate them show what the first rule was really about.
Core ideas
Three ideas.
A and an are one word in two shapes. The shape that ends in n is used so that two vowel sounds do not meet: an egg, not a egg. When the next word begins with a consonant sound, any sound that is not a vowel sound, there is nothing to separate, and a is enough. The reason is spoken, so the rule is spoken.
Most words that begin with a vowel letter begin with a vowel sound. The letter rule is right 486 times in 493 for that reason. It fails when the spelling and the sound come apart, and there are three ways for that to happen.
Say the next word. If it begins with a vowel sound, use an. If not, use a. Nothing about the lines changes. The question changes, and the number of exceptions falls from seven to none.
The material
Choose the letter rule and read the table of misses. All seven are in the play.
The rule you were taught is about letters, and letters are the wrong thing to look at. The lab holds 493 lines from three texts, each with an a or an and the word that follows.
Counted on this page, the rule that puts an before a vowel letter is right on 486 of the 493 lines, which is 98.6%. Seven lines break it. Look at what they are: a University, a utilitarian and an hour, which the play uses five times.
Most words begin with the sound their first letter suggests, and a rule about letters is easier to teach than a rule about sounds. That is the whole reason. The rule is a short way of writing the real one, and it is a good short way: 98.6% is a high score.
Change the question to the first sound of the next word, and the rule is right on all 493 lines. Nothing about the lines changed. The question changed. The same words are in the same table, and the column that said missed is empty.
The dictionary gives the sound. That is the sound of hour, which is the vowel in our, and of University, which starts as you does. Seven of these lines, and no more, are what separated the two rules here.
Switch the lab to the play, to the modern documents or to the passage from the novel. The play has 455 lines. The letter rule is right on 448 of them and the sound rule on all 455. On the modern documents both rules are right on 29 of 29, and on the passage both are right on 9 of 9. The table also sets aside ten marks that look like a but are not the word, such as (a) and a page number 21a.
The modern documents show that the two rules agree for most words. The play is where they part, and all seven lines that separate them are in it.
The page cannot carry the whole of Pride and Prejudice. A count made once, away from this page, over its 2,266 lines gives the letter rule 2,239 right (98.8%) and the sound rule 2,263 right (99.9%). That count is quoted here and not computed on this page. The three lines the sound rule misses are an union, twice, and an uniform. They are Austen's habit, and the habit has gone.
It reads one way of saying each word, the American one. In a different kind of English some words begin with a different sound, and the choice of a or an follows. The lab says so in its own words, under the numbers, and lists the 17 lines the dictionary cannot score.
Interactive
Every a and an in three printed texts, with the word after it
Method
Four steps.
Ignore the spelling. In hour the first sound is the vowel sound in our. In university it is the sound at the start of you.
A vowel sound is made with the mouth open and the air not stopped. If yes, use an: an hour, an egg, an answer.
A University, a utilitarian, a house. You and one begin with a consonant sound, whatever the letter says.
A u said like you, a silent h, and one. These are the words to remember. For everything else the letter and the sound agree.
The seven lines that the letter rule misses come from three words. In each case the first letter and the first sound disagree.
The first two begin with a vowel letter said as a consonant. The third begins with a consonant letter that is not said at all. Five of the seven misses are an hour, which the play uses five times. A third kind is one, which begins with the sound of w and so takes a. It is not among the seven. It appears in the count over the whole novel, quoted here, as a one among the lines the letter rule misses.
You should be able to say the first sound of a word, choose the small word that goes before it, read both the letter rule's score and the sound rule's score off the printed lines, and name the kinds of word where the two rules disagree.
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