---
title: They are strange people, these poets," thought the clerk. " — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: They are strange people, these poets," thought the clerk. " Who acts: poets, strange people. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Clerk's Transformation, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Clerk's Transformation, sentence 24

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They are strange people, these poets," thought the clerk. "

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**Who acts:** poets, strange people · **What happens:** be, think · **To what, where:** strange people, clerk

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Clerk's Transformation. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (poets, strange people), 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:pg27200:44:24
# text = They are strange people, these poets," thought the clerk. "
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
3	strange	strange	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
6	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	7	det	_	_
7	poets	poet	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
10	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	clerk	clerk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
14	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present | poets *= poet* | strange people and this poets |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* *in a quote* | past | strange people and this poets | the clerk |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot clerk=Theme |

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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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