---
title: The giant started when he saw him, and began to stammer out: “Oh! de… — The Blue Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The giant started when he saw him, and began to stammer out: “Oh! dear me; is it you? Who acts: giant, Jack, room. A sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The History of Jack the Giant-killer, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Blue Fairy Book, The History of Jack the Giant-killer, sentence 36

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The giant started when he saw him, and began to stammer out: “Oh! dear me; is it you?

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**Who acts:** giant, Jack, room · **What happens:** start, see, begin, stammer out, be · **To what, where:** club, you · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The History of Jack the Giant-killer. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (giant, Jack, room), 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:pg503:54:36
# text = The giant started when he saw him, and began to stammer out: “Oh! dear me; is it you?
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	giant	giant	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	started	start	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	6	advmod	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	advcl	_	_
7	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	stammer	stammer	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	xcomp	_	_
13	out	out	ADP	RP	_	12	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	_
15	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	Oh	oh	INTJ	UH	_	18	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	16	punct	_	_
18	dear	dear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	parataxis	_	_
19	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	cop	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	3	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **start** | past | the giant |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **see** | past | Jack | club |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer he=Stimulus |
| 3 | **begin** | past | the giant *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **stammer out** *speech: other* | to-infinitive | the giant *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | room | you |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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:** «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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