---
title: ‘Now play me a lullaby,’ roared the Giant; and the harp played a swe… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Now play me a lullaby,’ roared the Giant; and the harp played a sweet lullaby, to the sound of which its master fell asleep. Who acts: you, harp, master. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Talking Harp., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Talking Harp., sentence 20

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‘Now play me a lullaby,’ roared the Giant; and the harp played a sweet lullaby, to the sound of which its master fell asleep.

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**Who acts:** you, harp, master · **What happens:** play, roar, fall · **To what, where:** lullaby, me, Giant, sweet lullaby

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Talking Harp.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, harp, master), 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:pg540:19:20
# text = ‘Now play me a lullaby,’ roared the Giant; and the harp played a sweet lullaby, to the sound of which its master fell asleep.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	_
3	play	play	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	obj	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	lullaby	lullaby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
9	roared	roar	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	Giant	giant	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	harp	harp	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nsubj	_	_
16	played	play	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
17	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	sweet	sweet	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	lullaby	lullaby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	23	det	_	_
23	sound	sound	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	_
24	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	28	obl	_	_
26	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	27	nmod:poss	_	_
27	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	nsubj	_	_
28	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	acl:relcl	_	_
29	asleep	asleep	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **play** | imperative | you *not said here* | a lullaby | me |  | now |  | vn performance-26.7-1 «NP V NP.beneficiary NP»: agent=Agent i=Beneficiary lullaby=Theme |
| 2 | **roar** | past |  | the Giant |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location giant=Theme |
| 3 | **play** | past | the harp | a sweet lullaby |  |  |  | to the sound | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent lullaby=Theme |
| 4 | **fall** | past | harp's master |  |  |  |  | of the sound; asleep *property* | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme of which=Initial\_Location |

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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 Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 540 (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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