---
title: He always wanted the best of everything, and when he could not manag… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: He always wanted the best of everything, and when he could not manage it otherwise, he did it by magic. Who acts: man. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Drop of Water, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Drop of Water, sentence 8

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He always wanted the best of everything, and when he could not manage it otherwise, he did it by magic.

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**Who acts:** man · **What happens:** want, not manage, do · **To what, where:** name

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Drop of Water. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (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:pg27200:23:8
# text = He always wanted the best of everything, and when he could not manage it otherwise, he did it by magic.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	3	advmod	_	_
3	wanted	want	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	best	good	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	3	xcomp	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	everything	everything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Tot	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
10	when	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	14	mark	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
12	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	14	advmod	_	_
14	manage	manage	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	_
16	otherwise	otherwise	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	did	do	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
20	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	obj	_	_
21	by	by	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	magic	magic	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **want** | past | man |  |  |  |  | always, good *property* | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADJ»: agent=Pivot |
| 2 | **not** **manage** | could | man | name |  |  |  | otherwise *property* | vn caring-75.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Theme |
| 3 | **do** | past | man | name |  |  |  | by magic | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Eventuality |

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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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