Thread: «Я сижу на шее у человека, задавил его и требую, чтобы...»

(Простите, пожалуйста, что я пользую ангилском языком. Лет 50 тому назадь я довольно хорошо говорила по-русский, а с тех пор у меня вообще возможности говорть и не было, и то почти все утекло.)

I think I need a native speaker to puzzle this one out.

In his 1888 tract «Так Что Же Нам Делать?», Tolstoj wrote

«Я сижу на шее у человека, задавил его и требую, чтобы он вез меня.»

Why past tense (задавил) rather than a participle (i.e. ...у человека, задавший его, и требую...). Can someone tell me what the rule is that covers that construction?

I can't recall any such thing ever being dealt with in class, nor can I find it in any grammar book. I thought it might have been a modern transcription error, but I found in Google Books a facsimile copy of a 1902 book, published in Britain, of his collected essays that were banned in Russia, and the error, if it is an error, is printed there.

Большое спасибо за помощь.

Are you sure you understand the sentence right?
I’m sitting on a man’s neck, I’ve throttled him and now urging him to carry me on…

Could it be that the confusion is about the way the sentence is structured? In English it would be more natural to split it into two sentences, I think,
such as: "I sit on a man's neck; I have crushed him and demand that he carry me.

Originally Posted by Mairead

In his 1888 tract «Так что же нам делать?», Tolstoj wrote

Originally Posted by Mairead

«Я сижу на шее у человека, задавил его и требую, чтобы он вез меня.»

Why past tense (задавил) rather than a participle (i.e. ...у человека, задавший его, и требую...). Can someone tell me what the rule is that covers that construction?

It's possible to use a participle, but it would be "задавив": Я сижу на шее у человека, задавив его, и требую, чтобы он вез меня.

Originally Posted by Полуношник

It's possible to use a participle, but it would be "задавив": Я сижу на шее у человека, задавив его, и требую, чтобы он вез меня.

But in this case it sounds unnatural and clumsy.

Originally Posted by koynas

Could it be that the confusion is about the way the sentence is structured? In English it would be more natural to split it into two sentences, I think,
such as: "I sit on a man's neck; I have crushed him and demand that he carry me.

Yes, it's the grammatical structure that's the problem for me. I've no difficulty understanding what it's meant to mean.

Russian and English are both IE languages and, if we ignore minor differences such as agglutination and how case and tense are encoded, their grammars are nearly identical. There's nothing really "strange" or "foreign" about one language to a fluent speaker whose first language is the other one.

So in English, I'd express Tolstoj's concept as: "I sit on a person's neck/back, crushing him, and demand that he carry me". Or, if I want to emphasise that the crushing has been completed: "Having crushed him, I sit on a person's back and demand that he carry me" or possibly "I sit on a person's back and demand that he carry me even though I have crushed him".

Translating into Russian, only in the last case would I use simple past: «Я сижу на шее у человека и требую, чтобы он вез меня хотя и я его задавил». Otherwise it would be «...у человека, задающий его, и требую...» or «Задав его, я сижу на шее....» (I've probably malformed the participle and deeprichastie in those last two, but that's unimportant in context).

No one here who's a native speaker sees anything strange in Tolstoj's construction? It doesn't sound "off" at all to a native speaker? If that's the case, it'll be the first thing I've ever read in Russian that's made it seem a "foreign" language to me, as (e.g.) Japanese does.

Originally Posted by Mairead

but that's unimportant in context.

Oh RLY?..

No one here who's a native speaker sees anything strange in Tolstoj's construction? It doesn't sound "off" at all to a native speaker?

Tolstoy's sentence is perfect. What does sound strange and off, is variants you suggest, even if there were correct participles in them.

[s:sv9p87yd]«...у человека, задающий его, и требую...»[/s:sv9p87yd] This one doesn't make sense
«Задавив его, я сижу на шее....»

Thanks to everyone for your help. You gave me what I needed.

С счастливым и здоровым новым годом, всем.