---
title: The thing was very heavy, and he thought his back would break under… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The thing was very heavy, and he thought his back would break under the strain. Who acts: thing, Prince, back. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 14, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/14/98/)

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 14, sentence 98

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The thing was very heavy, and he thought his back would break under the strain.

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**Who acts:** thing, Prince, back · **What happens:** be, think, break · **To what, where:** strain · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 14. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (thing, Prince, back), 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:pg2435:14:98
# text = The thing was very heavy, and he thought his back would break under the strain.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	very	very	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	heavy	heavy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
10	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	back	back	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	nsubj	_	_
12	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	break	break	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	_
14	under	under	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	strain	strain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	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 thing |  |  |  |  | heavy *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | Prince |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 3 | **break** | would | Prince's back |  |  | the strain |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme under strain=Location |

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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 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.

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