Ty/Vy oddities?

[Paul B. Gallagher]

Mark Nuckols wrote:

> This discussion reminds me of a scene from /Табор уходит в небо/, in
> which Rada (the lead female role), in the company of female friends,
> persuades an aristocrat to allow her to drive his coach. She then
> tells her companions, "Чаяле, залезай!" (Girls, climb in!) The mix of
> Romani and Russian doesn't concern me, so let's just pretend she said
> "Девушки, залезай!" with a nominative/vocative plural followed by a
> second person /singular/ imperative.
>
> To give it more context, she and the aristocrat (this is their first
> meeting) had quickly switched from вы to ты. Given the differences
> in class, gender and ethnicity, it seems inappropriate for the
> setting of 1900. At any rate, perhaps Rada then re-establishes the
> closer relationship with her friends by using the ты form when
> addressing several of them.
>
> That's just my speculation. Native speakers?

I'm not a native speaker -- and perhaps neither is Rada -- but I'd like 
to throw out the following hypothesis:

Just as вы can be used in the polite sense without regard to number, ты 
can also be used in the intimate sense without regard to number. Both 
pronouns have two purposes, and sometimes the intimate/polite contrast 
takes precedence. А вы (один) согласны? ;-)

I may have overdrawn the hypothesis; in my experience, the plural use of 
ты is much rarer than the singular use of вы (I find your example 
anomalous for the language but not for the character). But I still think 
it bears examination.

-- 
War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left.
--
Paul B. Gallagher
pbg translations, inc.
"Russian Translations That Read Like Originals"
http://pbg-translations.com

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