La Grammaire au Service de la Galanterie? Analyse de Les « Vous » et les « Tu » de Voltaire

Abstract

In his epistle Les "Vous" et les "Tu", Voltaire calls his sweetheart "tu" and
"valls" alternately. He could use the familiar address when she was young
and unambitious, but now that she has become a rich and distant lady, this
familiarity is not possible anymore. This alternation of formal and infonnal
address, analysed in the light of the theory of politeness, evokes the many,
someti.rncs contradictory, values of these two pronouns .