---
title: ‘Ah, wife!’ replied the fisherman, ‘the fish cannot make an emperor,… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Ah, wife!’ replied the fisherman, ‘the fish cannot make an emperor, I am sure, and I should not like to ask him for such a thing.’ Who acts: wife, fish, I. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Fisherman and His Wife, 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/pg2591/11/65/)

<!-- 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/) / [Grimms' Fairy Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/) / [The Fisherman and His Wife](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/11/) / 65

# Grimms' Fairy Tales, The Fisherman and His Wife, sentence 65

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘Ah, wife!’ replied the fisherman, ‘the fish cannot make an emperor, I am sure, and I should not like to ask him for such a thing.’

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** wife, fish, I · **What happens:** reply, not make, be, not like, ask · **To what, where:** fisherman, emperor, fish

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, The Fisherman and His Wife. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wife, fish, I), 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:pg2591:11:65
# text = ‘Ah, wife!’ replied the fisherman, ‘the fish cannot make an emperor, I am sure, and I should not like to ask him for such a thing.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Ah	ah	INTJ	UH	_	7	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
4	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
7	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	fisherman	fisherman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
11	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
14	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	parataxis	_	_
17	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	emperor	emperor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
20	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
21	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	22	cop	_	_
22	sure	sure	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
25	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
26	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
27	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	28	advmod	_	_
28	like	like	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	ccomp	_	_
29	to	to	PART	TO	_	30	mark	_	_
30	ask	ask	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	xcomp	_	_
31	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	30	obj	_	_
32	for	for	ADP	IN	_	35	case	_	_
33	such	such	DET	PDT	PronType=Ind	35	det:predet	_	_
34	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	35	det	_	_
35	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	30	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
37	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | wife | the fisherman |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent fisherman=Topic |
| 2 | **not** **make** | can | the fish | a emperor |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent emperor=Product |
| 3 | **is** | present | I |  |  |  |  | sure *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **not** **like** | should | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme |
| 5 | **ask** *speech: ask* *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | I *not said here* |  | fish |  |  | for such thing | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent he=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:** «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 2591 (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 64](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/11/64/)
- next →: [sentence 66](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/11/66/)
- ↑ back to [The Fisherman and His Wife](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2591/11/)