---
title: 'What can it be?' she asked, turning to her guide; who answered: — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: 'What can it be?' she asked, turning to her guide; who answered: Who acts: sun, queen. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 22, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg3027/22/44/)

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 22, sentence 44

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'What can it be?' she asked, turning to her guide; who answered:

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**Who acts:** sun, queen · **What happens:** be, ask, turn, answer · **To what, where:** guide · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 22. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sun, queen), 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:pg3027:22:44
# text = 'What can it be?' she asked, turning to her guide; who answered:
1	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	5	obj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	be	be	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
9	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
11	turning	turn	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	9	advcl	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	guide	guide	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	17	nsubj	_	_
17	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	17	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **can** | can | sun |  |  |  |  |  | vn representation-110.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot what=Theme |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | queen |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **turn** | gerund | queen *not said here* |  |  | queen's guide |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V PP.trajectory»: agent=Theme to guide=Trajectory |
| 4 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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:** «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3027 (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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