---
title: What my friends call life and enjoyment is a passing shadow; it is l… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: What my friends call life and enjoyment is a passing shadow; it is like bubbles among seething dregs, not the pure heavenly wine that consecrates us to life." Who acts: friends, enjoyment, life, pure heavenly wine. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Psyche,
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Psyche, sentence 60

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What my friends call life and enjoyment is a passing shadow; it is like bubbles among seething dregs, not the pure heavenly wine that consecrates us to life."

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**Who acts:** friends, enjoyment, life, pure heavenly wine · **What happens:** call, pass, be, seethe, consecrate · **To what, where:** life, passing shadow, us · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Psyche. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (friends, enjoyment, life, pure heavenly wine), 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:pg27200:151:60
# text = What my friends call life and enjoyment is a passing shadow; it is like bubbles among seething dregs, not the pure heavenly wine that consecrates us to life."
1	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	4	obj	_	_
2	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	friends	friend	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nsubj	_	_
4	call	call	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
7	enjoyment	enjoyment	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
8	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
9	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	passing	pass	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	11	amod	_	_
11	shadow	shadow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	16	punct	_	_
13	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
14	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	16	cop	_	_
15	like	like	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	bubbles	bubble	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
17	among	among	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	seething	seethe	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	19	amod	_	_
19	dregs	dreg	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
21	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	25	advmod	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
23	pure	pure	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
24	heavenly	heavenly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	25	amod	_	_
25	wine	wine	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	conj	_	_
26	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	27	nsubj	_	_
27	consecrates	consecrate	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	25	acl:relcl	_	_
28	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	27	obj	_	_
29	to	to	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **call** | present | my friends | life and a passing shadow |  |  |  |  | vn dub-29.3.2 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Agent what=Theme life=Result |
| 2 | **pass** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **is a** | present | enjoyment | a passing shadow |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **is** | present | life |  |  |  |  | like bubbles and the pure heavenly wine; among seething dregs | tree rules |
| 5 | **seethe** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn bulge-47.5.3 «NP V»: agent=Location |
| 6 | **consecrate** | present | the pure heavenly wine | us |  |  |  | to life | vn dub-29.3.2 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Agent we=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.

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**Text:** «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (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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