---
title: I would rather have remained a monkey all my life than let my benefa… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: I would rather have remained a monkey all my life than let my benefactress perish in this shocking manner. Who acts: I, benefactress. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 11, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 11, sentence 3

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I would rather have remained a monkey all my life than let my benefactress perish in this shocking manner.

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**Who acts:** I, benefactress · **What happens:** remain, let, perish · **To what, where:** monkey, benefactress, shocking manner

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 11. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, benefactress), 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:pg128:11:3
# text = I would rather have remained a monkey all my life than let my benefactress perish in this shocking manner.
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
2	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
3	rather	rather	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
4	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	aux	_	_
5	remained	remain	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	monkey	monkey	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	10	det:predet	_	_
9	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl:unmarked	_	_
11	than	than	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
12	let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	advcl	_	_
13	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	benefactress	benefactress	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	perish	perish	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	xcomp	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
17	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	19	det	_	_
18	shocking	shocking	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	manner	manner	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **remain** | would · perfect | I | a monkey |  |  |  | my life *obl:unmarked* | vn seem-109-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme monkey=Attribute |
| 2 | **let** | infinitive | I *not said here* | my benefactress |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **perish** | infinitive | my benefactress *not said here* |  |  | this shocking manner |  |  | vn break\_down-45.8 «NP V»: agent=Patient |

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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 Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 128 (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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