---
title: I did not at first understand all this, but afterwards he explained… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: I did not at first understand all this, but afterwards he explained the whole story to me; and here it is:-- Who acts: I, man. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Puppet-show Man, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Puppet-show Man, sentence 5

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I did not at first understand all this, but afterwards he explained the whole story to me; and here it is:--

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**Who acts:** I, man · **What happens:** not understand, explain, be · **To what, where:** this, whole story, me

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Puppet-show Man. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, man), 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:pg27200:152:5
# text = I did not at first understand all this, but afterwards he explained the whole story to me; and here it is:--
1	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
2	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
4	at	at	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	first	first	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	6	obl	_	_
6	understand	understand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	8	det:predet	_	_
8	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
10	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
11	afterwards	afterwards	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
12	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	explained	explain	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
17	to	to	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	here	here	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	parataxis	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	21	cop	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	25	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	--	--	PUNCT	NFP	_	6	conj	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **understand** | past · do-support | I | this |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer this=Stimulus |
| 2 | **explain** *speech: assert* | past | man | the whole story | me |  |  | afterwards *property* | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent story=Topic to i=Recipient |
| 3 | **is** | present |  |  |  |  |  | here *property* | tree rules |

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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:** «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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