---
title: For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor… — The Velveteen Rabbit · tree and pragmatics
description: For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him. Who acts: Rabbit, one. A sentence of «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Opening, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Velveteen Rabbit, Opening, sentence 17

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For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him.

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**Who acts:** Rabbit, one · **What happens:** live, think · **To what, where:** toy cupboard

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This is a sentence of «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Opening. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Rabbit, one), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg11757:1:17
# text = For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him.
1	For	for	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	toy	toy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	compound	_	_
10	cupboard	cupboard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
11	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
12	on	on	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	nursery	nursery	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	compound	_	_
15	floor	floor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
18	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	19	det	_	_
19	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
20	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
21	very	very	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	much	much	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
23	about	about	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **live** | past | Rabbit |  |  | the toy cupboard or the nursery floor | time |  | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in cupboard=Location |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | no one |  |  |  |  | about Rabbit | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V PP.topic»: agent=Agent about he=Topic |

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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.

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**Text:** «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Project Gutenberg book 11757 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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