---
title: “I would return good for evil,” he said to himself, “and save the un… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: “I would return good for evil,” he said to himself, “and save the unhappy man’s life.” Who acts: Darling. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Darling, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, Prince Darling, sentence 118

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“I would return good for evil,” he said to himself, “and save the unhappy man’s life.”

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**Who acts:** Darling · **What happens:** return, say, save · **To what, where:** good, Darling, life · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Prince Darling. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Darling), 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:pg503:39:118
# text = “I would return good for evil,” he said to himself, “and save the unhappy man’s life.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	return	return	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	ccomp	_	_
5	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	obj	_	_
6	for	for	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	evil	evil	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	17	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	save	save	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	ccomp	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	unhappy	unhappy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	’s	's	PART	POS	_	20	case	_	_
22	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	17	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	17	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **return** *in a quote* | would | Darling | good |  |  |  | for evil | vn send-11.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent good=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Darling |  | Darling |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to himself=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **save** *in a quote* | infinitive |  | the unhappy man's life |  |  |  |  | vn get-13.5.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent life=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:** «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 503 (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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