---
title: They still ask the Editor how he can invent so many stories—more tha… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: They still ask the Editor how he can invent so many stories—more than Shakespeare, Dumas, and Charles Dickens could have invented in a century. Who acts: ladies, Fairy. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/1/10/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Crimson Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/) / [The Crimson Fairy Book, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/1/) / 10

# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 1, sentence 10

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
They still ask the Editor how he can invent so many stories—more than Shakespeare, Dumas, and Charles Dickens could have invented in a century.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** ladies, Fairy · **What happens:** ask, invent · **To what, where:** Editor, many stories, Charles

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (ladies, Fairy), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg2435:1:10
# text = They still ask the Editor how he can invent so many stories—more than Shakespeare, Dumas, and Charles Dickens could have invented in a century.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	still	still	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	ask	ask	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	Editor	editor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	9	advmod	_	_
7	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	invent	invent	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
10	so	so	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	many	many	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	stories	story	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	—	-	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	3	conj	_	_
15	than	than	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	Shakespeare	Shakespeare	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
18	Dumas	duma	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
21	Charles	Charles	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	25	nsubj:pass	_	_
22	Dickens	Dickens	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	flat	_	_
23	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	25	aux	_	_
24	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	25	aux	_	_
25	invented	invent	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	conj	_	_
26	in	in	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	century	century	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | present | ladies *= lady* | the Editor |  |  | still |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP whether S»: agent=Agent editor=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 2 | **invent** *not said to happen* | can | Fairy | many stories |  |  |  |  | vn create-26.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent story=Result |
| 3 | **invent** | could · perfect · passive |  | Charles |  |  | century |  | vn create-26.4-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Result |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 2435 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/1/9/)
- next →: [sentence 11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/1/11/)
- ↑ back to [The Crimson Fairy Book, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/1/)