---
title: I shall master it!' says he; but yet he cannot master it, however lo… — Andersen's Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: I shall master it!' says he; but yet he cannot master it, however long he plays.” Who acts: I, landlord. A sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Shadow, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Andersen's Fairy Tales, The Shadow, sentence 15

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I shall master it!' says he; but yet he cannot master it, however long he plays.”

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**Who acts:** I, landlord · **What happens:** master, say, not master, play · **To what, where:** opposite, landlord · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Shadow. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, landlord), 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:pg1597:23:15
# text = I shall master it!' says he; but yet he cannot master it, however long he plays.”
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	master	master	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
7	says	say	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	advcl	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	15	punct	_	_
10	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
11	yet	yet	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
13	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	15	advmod	_	_
15	master	master	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
16	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	however	however	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
19	long	long	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	15	advmod	_	_
20	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
21	plays	play	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **master** | shall | I | opposite |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | I *not said here* | landlord |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent he=Topic |
| 3 | **not** **master** | can | landlord | opposite |  |  | yet | long *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **play** | present | landlord |  |  |  |  |  | vn performance-26.7-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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:** «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 1597 (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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