---
title: Not wishing, however, to cut a poor figure at the ball by the side o… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Not wishing, however, to cut a poor figure at the ball by the side of the other dancers, he went at once to the laurels, and said: Who acts: Gazer. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, sentence 160

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Not wishing, however, to cut a poor figure at the ball by the side of the other dancers, he went at once to the laurels, and said:

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**Who acts:** Gazer · **What happens:** not wish, cut, go, say · **To what, where:** poor figure, ball, laurels · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Twelve Dancing Princesses. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Gazer), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg540:2:160
# text = Not wishing, however, to cut a poor figure at the ball by the side of the other dancers, he went at once to the laurels, and said:
1	Not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	2	advmod	_	_
2	wishing	wish	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	23	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
4	however	however	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	cut	cut	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	advcl	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	figure	figure	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
11	at	at	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	ball	ball	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
14	by	by	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	side	side	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	dancers	dancer	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
22	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	31	advcl	_	_
24	at	at	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
25	once	once	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Mult	23	obl	_	_
26	to	to	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	28	det	_	_
28	laurels	laurel	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	23	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	31	punct	_	_
30	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
31	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	31	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **wish** | gerund | Gazer *not said here* |  |  |  |  | however *property* | vn wish-62 «NP V for NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |
| 2 | **cut** | to-infinitive | Gazer *not said here* | a poor figure |  | the ball |  | by the side of the other dancers | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset figure=Product |
| 3 | **go** | past | Gazer |  |  | the laurels |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to laurel=Initial\_Location |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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 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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