---
title: Once upon a time the things in this story happened, and if they had… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Once upon a time the things in this story happened, and if they had not happened then the story would never have been told. Who acts: things, brothers. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 9, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/9/61/)

<!-- 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 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/9/) / 61

# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 9, sentence 61

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Once upon a time the things in this story happened, and if they had not happened then the story would never have been told.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** things, brothers · **What happens:** happen, not happen, not tell · **To what, where:** story · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (things, brothers), 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:pg2435:9:61
# text = Once upon a time the things in this story happened, and if they had not happened then the story would never have been told.
1	Once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	10	advmod	_	_
2	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	things	thing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	9	det	_	_
9	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nmod	_	_
10	happened	happen	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
13	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
14	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
15	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
16	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	17	advmod	_	_
17	happened	happen	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	10	parataxis	_	_
18	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	25	advmod	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj:pass	_	_
21	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	25	aux	_	_
22	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	25	advmod	_	_
23	have	have	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	25	aux	_	_
24	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	25	aux:pass	_	_
25	told	tell	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	17	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **happen** | past | the things in this story |  |  |  | time | once *property* | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **not** **happen** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | brothers *= brother* |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **not** **tell** *speech: assert* | would · perfect · passive |  | the story |  |  | then |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: subject=Recipient |

<!-- .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 60](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/9/60/)
- next →: [sentence 62](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/9/62/)
- ↑ back to [The Crimson Fairy Book, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2435/9/)