---
title: 'I am too ugly even for a dog to eat,' said he to himself. ' — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: 'I am too ugly even for a dog to eat,' said he to himself. ' Who acts: I, dog. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 9, sentence 42

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'I am too ugly even for a dog to eat,' said he to himself. '

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**Who acts:** I, dog · **What happens:** be, eat, say · **To what, where:** dog · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I, dog), 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:pg3027:9:42
# text = 'I am too ugly even for a dog to eat,' said he to himself. '
1	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	too	too	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	ugly	ugly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	ccomp	_	_
6	even	even	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
7	for	for	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	dog	dog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
10	to	to	PART	TO	_	11	mark	_	_
11	eat	eat	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
14	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
16	to	to	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	_
19	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | I |  |  |  |  | for a dog; ugly *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **eat** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | dog |  | dog |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to himself=Recipient |

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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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