Guest post by Jonathan A. Gallant

My adolescence, which went on for 50 years, was a difficult period.  I was afflicted by  perpetual dissatisfaction and  unease.   I could never seem to find myself, although I searched everywhere: in closets, in the refrigerator, under my bed, behind the the piano.   I had almost reached the age of retirement before I finally discovered the solution to my problem.  By then, the academic world was filled with news of individuals who claimed that they had been born in the wrong body.  When this news reached me, I had an epiphany: the wrong body issue was no doubt the source of my own difficulties, and thus it implied the solution. 

   The body that had been assigned to me at birth was not, I realized, the body I really ought to have.  What I felt like, and therefore the body I should have, was that of a direct descendent of Dmitri Ivanovich, the lost son of Tsar Ivan IV, also known as Ivan the Terrible.  It follows that I should be, and therefore am, on the direct line of the Terrible dynasty, and thus I am a proper claimant to the imperial throne of the Russian Empire. 

  My chosen personal pronoun is его императорское величество, Russian for “his imperial majesty”.  In direct communication, I must always be addressed in its second person (plural) form, which is: Ваше императорское величество .
I trust that this story will be illuminating in regard to the burning issue of Pronouns.

   Ivan V, Царь Всея Руси    (formerly Jon Gallant)