I have a dumb beginner question on the usage of あなた. I thought, あなた was used only when you don’t know the person’s name, in forms, or as a term of endearment for one’s boyfriend/husband. Otherwise I thought it was pretty rude. But when 石神 and 草薙 are talking to each other, they’re being super polite, keigo-ing each other, and they clearly know each other’s name, and yet they use あなた a couple of times. I’m confused.
It’s all about context. あなた is also a formal “you” (actually, that’s it’s basic meaning). If the rest of the sentence is formal, among acquaintances or more, it’s fine. (NB: only if the person is of equal or inferior social rank).
In other contexts, it can indeed be considered rude. I guess that’s similar to the drift in meaning that happened to 貴様. Used to be super formal, only used for people of higher social rank, now super rude.
I‘m still not quite sure why 石神 would do all this for a person he barely knows. Why throw away his life like that? Doesn’t he have math problems to solve? Or does he want to go to prison and spend his time doing maths? He did say 紙と鉛筆があれば, so…
That’s exactly what I thought when reading that part. That he just wants to go to jail so he can work on his math problems without having to waste time teaching kids who don’t care about maths.
I really hope we get to read 森岡‘s essay about maths at some point… it’s been a while since that scene so I‘m starting to doubt it, but I’m really interested in what he wrote
Oof, that last bit. I’ve been feeling more and more hemmed in (in their place) while reading, and then that conversation with 湯川, where he is both kind and somehow ruthless, and then the phone call that made me weirdly sad while also further stressing me out, and then the end.
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Or does he want to go to prison and spend his time doing maths? He did say 紙と鉛筆があれば, so…
