---
title: But the tree was tall and strong, and it was hopeless to think of up… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: But the tree was tall and strong, and it was hopeless to think of uprooting it. Who acts: tree, it. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 42, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 42, sentence 93

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But the tree was tall and strong, and it was hopeless to think of uprooting it.

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**Who acts:** tree, it · **What happens:** be, think, uproot · **To what, where:** Tree

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 42. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (tree, it), 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:pg128:42:93
# text = But the tree was tall and strong, and it was hopeless to think of uprooting it.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	tree	tree	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
5	tall	tall	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	strong	strong	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
10	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
12	hopeless	hopeless	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	conj	_	_
13	to	to	PART	TO	_	14	mark	_	_
14	think	think	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	csubj	_	_
15	of	of	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
16	uprooting	uproot	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	14	advcl	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the tree |  |  |  |  | tall *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **be** |  | the tree *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** | past | it |  |  |  |  | hopeless *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **think** *speech: other* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **uproot** | gerund |  | Tree |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme |

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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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