---
title: “He is upstairs; you had better ask him,” answered the woman. — The Brown Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “He is upstairs; you had better ask him,” answered the woman. Who acts: husband, you, woman. A sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 21, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 21, sentence 93

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“He is upstairs; you had better ask him,” answered the woman.

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**Who acts:** husband, you, woman · **What happens:** be, have, ask, answer · **To what, where:** husband · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 21. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (husband, you, woman), 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:pg3282:21:93
# text = “He is upstairs; you had better ask him,” answered the woman.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	is	be	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	upstairs	upstairs	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	7	punct	_	_
6	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
8	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	7	xcomp	_	_
9	ask	ask	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	xcomp	_	_
10	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
13	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** *in a quote* | present | husband |  |  |  |  | upstairs *property* | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **have** *in a quote* | past | you |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* *in a quote* | infinitive | you *not said here* |  | husband |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent he=Recipient |
| 4 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past | the woman |  |  |  |  |  | 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 Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (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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