Pronouns of Address in Early Modern English, Based on Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing

Abstract

In the succeeding section of my thesis I will make an attempt to describe the relationships between some characters of Much Ado About Nothing from the points mentioned above, concerning the pronouns of address the characters use when addressing each other. I will string these relations in accordance with their complexity, moving from clear-cut connections to the direction of subtler and many-faceted ones. Finally, I will take a brief look at registers and dialects in which this pronominal opposition remained alive. My aim is to prove that the thou/you contrast is not only able to give a full portrayal of the social system in Elizabethan England, but also reflects the speakers’ attitude to their addressees, their motivation in a conversation and their alternating emotional state.