--- title: The Hatter's riddle «Why is a raven like a writing-desk?» has no ans… — Alice's word games: puns, parodies and nonsense · tree and pragmatics description: The Hatter's riddle «Why is a raven like a writing-desk?» has no answer; Carroll admitted it, though later he and his readers invented answers for fun. Who acts: riddle, Carroll, Hatter. A sentence of the lesson «Alice's word games: puns, parodies and nonsense» of the language course of Mova's prima --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/41-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense/15/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Language](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/) / [Alice's word games: puns, parodies and…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/41-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense/) / 15 # Alice's word games: puns, parodies and nonsense, sentence 15 The Hatter's riddle «Why is a raven like a writing-desk?» has no answer; Carroll admitted it, though later he and his readers invented answers for fun. **Who acts:** riddle, Carroll, Hatter · **What happens:** be, have, admit, invent, riddle · **To what, where:** raven, answer, answers · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the lesson «Alice's word games: puns, parodies and nonsense» of the language course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (riddle, Carroll, Hatter), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:language:041-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense.lesson:15 # text = The Hatter's riddle «Why is a raven like a writing-desk?» has no answer; Carroll admitted it, though later he and his readers invented answers for fun. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = language # lesson = 041-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense.lesson # annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1, R7-rel-agree ×1, R8-pos-agree ×4 1 The the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 2 det _ Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=4:det 2 Hatter Hatter PROPN NNP Number=Sing 4 nmod:poss _ Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=4:nmod:poss|HaikuPos=NOUN:NN:Number=Sing 3 's 's PART POS _ 2 case _ _ 4 riddle riddle NOUN NN Number=Sing 17 nsubj _ _ 5 « « PUNCT `` _ 9 punct _ Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=9:punct|HaikuPos=PUNCT:,:_ 6 Why why ADV WRB PronType=Int 9 advmod _ _ 7 is be AUX VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 9 cop _ _ 8 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 9 det _ _ 9 raven raven NOUN NN Number=Sing 4 appos _ _ 10 like like ADP IN _ 14 case _ _ 11 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 14 det _ _ 12 writing writing NOUN NN Number=Sing 14 compound _ _ 13 - - PUNCT HYPH _ 12 punct _ _ 14 desk desk NOUN NN Number=Sing 9 nmod _ _ 15 ? ? PUNCT . _ 9 punct _ _ 16 » » PUNCT '' _ 4 punct _ Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=4:punct|HaikuPos=PUNCT:,:_ 17 has have VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 18 no no DET DT PronType=Neg 19 det _ _ 19 answer answer NOUN NN Number=Sing 17 obj _ _ 20 ; ; PUNCT , _ 22 punct _ _ 21 Carroll Carroll PROPN NNP Number=Sing 22 nsubj _ Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=22:nsubj|HaikuPos=NOUN:NN:Number=Sing 22 admitted admit VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 17 parataxis _ Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=17:conj 23 it it PRON PRP Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 22 obj _ _ 24 , , PUNCT , _ 31 punct _ _ 25 though though SCONJ IN _ 31 mark _ _ 26 later late ADV RBR Degree=Cmp 31 advmod _ _ 27 he he PRON PRP Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs 31 nsubj _ _ 28 and and CCONJ CC _ 30 cc _ _ 29 his his PRON PRP$ Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs 30 nmod:poss _ _ 30 readers reader NOUN NNS Number=Plur 27 conj _ _ 31 invented invent VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 22 advcl _ _ 32 answers answer NOUN NNS Number=Plur 31 obj _ _ 33 for for ADP IN _ 34 case _ _ 34 fun fun NOUN NN Number=Sing 32 nmod _ _ 35 . . PUNCT . _ 17 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} No stored speech act for this sentence. | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | | a raven | | | | like a writing desk | tree rules | | 2 | **have** | present | the Hatter's riddle | no answer | | | | | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent answer=Patient | | 3 | **admit** *speech: other* | past | Carroll | answer | | | | | vn admit-64.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme | | 4 | **invent** | past | Carroll | answers | | | | for fun; late *property* | vn create-26.4-1 «NP V NP PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent answer=Result for fun=Beneficiary | | 5 | **riddle** | | the Hatter | | | | | | nom riddle «communication intransitive»: poss=agent | One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree. **Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:language:041-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense.lesson:15`. **The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1, R7-rel-agree ×1, R8-pos-agree ×4. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence. See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/). - ← previous: [Alice's word games: puns, parodies and…, 14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/41-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense/14/) - next →: [Alice's word games: puns, parodies and…, 17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/41-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense/17/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/41-alice-s-word-games-puns-parodies-and-nonsense/)