Ланцелот. Как тебя зовут?
Кот. Машенька.
Ланцелот. Я думал — ты кот.
Кот. Да, я кот, но люди иногда так невнимательны.
We start learning a foreign language with easy stuff. Really easy stuff. Say, introducing ourselves. Let’s assume that we all speak in “complete sentences”, that is, the ones containing both subject and predicate — even though we can do without them very well in real-life introductions [1]:
“Alex.”
“Liz. Nice to meet you.”
“You too.”
But I am sure your teacher will insist on complete sentences, so let’s try not annoy them, in whatever language [2]:
- — I’m Liz.
- — Je m’appelle Isabelle.
- — Me llamo Isabel.
- — Ich heiße Lise.
- — Меня зовут Лиза.
Whoa, wait a minute, you say. Are these really the same?
Of course not. The literal translation of the French sentence [2b] will be “I call myself Isabelle”, where we find a form of the reflexive verb s’appeler “to call oneself”. Likewise, in Spanish [2c], me llamo (first person singular of the reflexive verb llamarse) means “I call myself”, except there is no “I” in this phrase. It is possible to put the personal pronoun there, for the sake of “completeness”: Yo me llamo Isabel, but it is not really necessary.
The German version „Ich heiße“ also can be translated as “I call myself”, except there is no “myself” in the sentence [2d]: the verb heißen, although not reflexive, already means “to call oneself”.
«Меня зовут Лиза» [2e] superficially looks similar to “Me llamo Isabel”, or, at least, this was what I thought when I first heard the “Me llamo” construction. But no. There is no reflexive verb in [2e]. Instead, we have a “normal” transitive verb звать. The literal translation would be “They call me Liz”. Except there is no “they” either. And thus, no subject. But is it then a complete sentence?
Yes it is. We can’t add subject to it without changing its sense. «Они меня зовут Лиза» implies that it is only a specified group of people (они) who call me so (while my real name could be different).
So what is complete sentence anyway? I’m afraid this is the moment to delve into Russian grammar a bit deeper.
First, we need to make distinction between complete/incomplete and two-member/one-member sentences. Two-member sentences (двусоставные предложения) are those boring classical ones with both subject and predicate. One-member sentences (односоставные предложения) have either subject or predicate but not both. For instance, nominal sentences (назывные предложения) have at least one subject (подлежащее) but no predicate:
Зима!.. Крестьянин, торжествуя
На дровнях обновляет путь…
Ночь, улица, фонарь, аптека,
Бессмысленный и тусклый свет.
Чудное море! Чёрное море!
О, этот блеск плюс плеск близкой волны!
Sometimes, nominal sentences consist of just one word (so-called sentence word):
Лето. Жара. Мухи.
In Russian, there are several classes of one-member sentences that only have a predicate (сказуемое) but no subject. For example, impersonal sentences (безличные предложения), which also could be composed of single word:
Темно. “It’s dark.”
Вечерело. “It was getting dark.”
Холодает. “It’s getting cold.”
And yet they are compete, self-sufficient sentences.
In indefinite-personal sentences (неопределённо-личные предложения), the agent is either not important or unknown. The predicate is a verb in third person plural.
Мне позвонили. “I got a call.”
Его уволили. “He was fired.”
Говорят, что кур доят. “They milk chickens, they say.” (Don’t believe every thing you hear.)
«Меня зовут Лиза» belongs to this class too. One can also say «Меня зовут Лизой». What happens here? The name is changed from nominative (Лиза) to instrumental (Лизой). Some argue that using the instrumental case is more correct, or even the only correct. The reasoning here, I imagine, is as follows. The nominative case answers the questions кто? (who?) and что? (what?). Let’s ask Liz:
No, that’s wrong. We already know that in this situation “who” is irrelevant — that’s why they omit “they” from the sentence. The proper way to ask is
This, however, is the domain of the instrumental case which, in a schoolbook, answers the questions кем? (by whom?) and чем? (by what?) but also как? каким образом? (how?). On the other hand, it could be that the nominative in [2e] is in fact the vocative which, by the way, is called in Russian звательный падеж:
As the vocative form is identical to nominative and nobody hears the punctuation marks, we just stick to nominative. But, as I said, both forms are correct, it’s a matter of personal taste.
Кавалергард, генерал, сам крупный богатый помещик, и зовут его Павлом Петровичем… [Inst.]
Меня зовут Алексей Васильевич Турбин… [Nom.]
Instead of звать, one can use называть, кликать, величать, the meaning is the same:
В некотором селе жили два соседа: Иван Богатый да Иван Бедный. Богатого величали «сударем» и «Семенычем», а бедного — просто Иваном, а иногда и Ивашкой.
Меня называли орлёнком в отряде,
Враги называли орлом.
Веди нас к старшему, какого Александром Анисимычем кличут!
More informal, colloquial variant is «Меня звать Лиза» (or «Меня звать Лизой»). This is an example of infinitive sentence (инфинитивное предложение), which sometimes is considered a type of impersonal sentence.
— Как звать-то? — спросил поп, благословляя.
— Фёклой зовут.
Just like French and Spanish, Russian has reflexive verbs, viz. зваться and называться, which mean “to call oneself”. Why can’t we use them?
Я — поэт, зовусь я Цветик.
От меня вам всем приветик.
Я называюсь Колобком, я всем и каждому знаком.
These are complete two-member sentences, with subject (я) and predicate (зовусь, называюсь). Here too, one can put the name in either nominative or instrumental. Цветик seems to prefer former, Колобок latter.
In normal everyday Russian though you won’t hear introductions like «Я зовусь Лиза» or «Я называюсь Лиза». The verb называться is extremely common and is used in connection with the names of objects, living beings, places, organisations, works of art — in short, everything but personal names.
Заведение называлось «Улыбка». Я улыбнулся и пошел дальше.
If this verb is ever placed next to the name of a person, it is done for a somewhat comic effect:
Человечек был буфетчиком в Варьете и назывался Андрей Фокич Соков.
Так что я сейчас называюсь гвардии ефрейтор Вознесенский и служу при майоре Вознесенском связным.
The verb зваться can be used to talk about somebody else’s personal names:
Итак, она звалась Татьяной.
«Евгений Онегин»
Звался он Луи Второй…
A beautiful poem by David Samoylov makes use of both reflexive (звалась) and transitive (звали) verbs and, curiously, has names (of winters) in both nominative and instrumental:
Давид Самойлов
Названья зим
У зим бывают имена.
Одна из них звалась Наталья.
И были в ней мерцанье, тайна,
И холод, и голубизна.
Еленою звалась зима,
И Марфою, и Катериной.
И я порою зимней, длинной
Влюблялся и сходил с ума.
И были дни, и падал снег,
Как тёплый пух зимы туманной.
А эту зиму звали Анной,
Она была прекрасней всех.
Another common way to introduce ourselves is similar to the English one. «Я — Лиза» is an almost literal translation of “I am Liz”, except there is no “am”. In modern Russian есть, the present tense form of the verb быть “to be”, is normally omitted.
— Тише, молчать, — отвечал учитель чистым русским языком, — молчать или вы пропали. Я Дубровский.
Голубков. Как? Вы русский? А я вас принял за француза. Как я рад!
Антуан. Так точно, я русский. Я — Грищенко.
— Я — Швондер, она — Вяземская, он — товарищ Пеструхин и Жаровкин.
In the last quote, Mr. Schwonder introduces not only himself but the rest of his entourage.
Interestingly, the future forms of быть such as будешь and especially будете and будет, can be present when asking about one’s name (origin, occupation etc.):
Бунша (Милославскому). Я извиняюсь, вы кто же такой будете?
Милославский. Кто я такой буду, вы говорите? Я дожидаюсь моего друга Шпака.
If it sounded slightly old-fashioned already in the last century, the Strugatsky brothers predicted that by the 23rd century this particular use of будет will die out completely, as illustrated by the misunderstanding between 20th– and 23rd-century interlocutors, respectively:
— А отец ваш, извините, кем будет?
— Кем будет? Наверное, так и останется мелиоратором.
“And your father, I beg my pardon, who might he be?”
“Who will he be? Most likely, he will remain a land ameliorator.”
So, both two-member and one-member sentences can be complete (полные предложения). Also, both two-member and one-member sentences can be incomplete (неполные предложения). This happens when some formally necessary member(s) such as subject, predicate or object are omitted but the meaning of the sentence is clear from the context or situation.
Женя. Вас как зовут?
Надя. Надя.
Женя. Меня Женя.
Here, only the first sentence is complete (although, as we know, it’s one-member). The rest are incomplete and their meaning cannot be understood out of context.
Let’s start again.
As mentioned before, Russian reciprocal verbs can lose all elegance in English translation. For example, познакомиться is “to introduce oneselves to each other”, so «Давайте познакомимся» is “Let’s introduce ourselves to each other” or “Let’s get acquainted”. No wonder English speakers never say anything like that before embarking on actual introductions.
This is how the dialogue [1] goes in Russian:
— Я Саша.
— Лиза. Очень приятно.
— Взаимно.
By now you know that one-word sentence «Лиза» could be one of several things. It could be either incomplete one-member sentence «Меня зовут Лиза» or (also incomplete) two-member sentence «Я Лиза». It even could be a complete (one-member) nominal sentence that uses vocative: «Лиза!» In the end, it doesn’t matter: your name in nominative will suffice.
— Максудов, — сказал я с достоинством.
— Изя Кацман, — представился он бархатным голосом. — Мусорщик.
— Сельма Нагель, — лениво отозвалась Сельма, протягивая руку. — Шлюха.
— Гроссмейстер О. Бендер! — заявил Остап, присаживаясь на стол. — Устраиваю у вас сеанс одновременной игры.
__________________________________________________
* I prefer «Как Вас зовут?» to «Как тебя зовут?» because it is more polite: you really have to know another person’s name before even thinking of switching to ты or “тыкать”.
sólo algunas palabras 