откликнуться

[Interprete]

Hello,

I just came across the verb откликнуться in the sense of 'answering a call'. After some digging into it's morphology, I see that it comes from кликнуть which means 'to call'. So the root means 'to call', and adding ot- and -ся around it makes it become 'to answer the call'.

I thought this was interesting and was wondering what the logic behind it was. Is this a consistent pattern with the same effect across several such verb pairs?

Thanks.

 

[Awwal12]

"Откликнуться", to be specific, is
1. to answer a call (vocally);
2. by extension: to respond (typically with a vocal or written message of some sort).

Is this a consistent pattern with the same effect across several such verb pairs?

I don't think so. However, cf. отозваться (the same as откликнуться 1).

 

[nizzebro]

The logic is echoing the call (btw, эхо откликнулось is a common collocation for echo).
There is a noun клик which is not about appeal but rather of uttering a specific sound - a short cry e.g. of a bird,
and, also, клич, which is either a call e.g. to gather, or a cry as a war cry - боевой клич, a club or a scout cry ("клич пионера - всегда будь готов").
So, I guess, the stem is primarily about a sound and not calling out somebody.