---
title: "The child is mine," she answered; "I can murder him if I like, and… — Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen · tree and pragmatics
description: "The child is mine," she answered; "I can murder him if I like, and you too, Giannina." Who acts: child, Felicita. A sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Metal Pig, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Metal Pig, sentence 76

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"The child is mine," she answered; "I can murder him if I like, and you too, Giannina."

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**Who acts:** child, Felicita · **What happens:** be, answer, murder, like · **To what, where:** Felicita, boy · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Metal Pig. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (child, Felicita), 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:pg27200:89:76
# text = "The child is mine," she answered; "I can murder him if I like, and you too, Giannina."
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	child	child	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
5	mine	my	PRON	PRP	Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	_
8	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
11	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
13	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
14	murder	murder	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	conj	_	_
15	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	_
16	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
17	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	like	like	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	14	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
21	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
22	too	too	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
24	Giannina	Giannina	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	24	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	24	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | the child | Felicita |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | Felicita |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **murder** *in a quote* | can | Felicita | boy |  |  |  |  | vn murder-42.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient |
| 4 | **like** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | present | Felicita |  |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |

<!-- .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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