---
title: But he would not answer any questions, and pretended to be deaf and… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But he would not answer any questions, and pretended to be deaf and dumb. Who acts: boatman. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Princess Mayblossom, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Princess Mayblossom, part 2, sentence 65

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But he would not answer any questions, and pretended to be deaf and dumb.

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**Who acts:** boatman · **What happens:** not answer, pretend, be · **To what, where:** questions

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Princess Mayblossom, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (boatman), 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:pg540:4:65
# text = But he would not answer any questions, and pretended to be deaf and dumb.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	answer	answer	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	any	any	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	7	det	_	_
7	questions	question	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
10	pretended	pretend	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
12	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	cop	_	_
13	deaf	deaf	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	xcomp	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	dumb	dumb	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **answer** *speech: assert* | would | boatman | any questions |  |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent question=Eventuality |
| 2 | **pretend** | past | boatman *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **is** | to-infinitive | boatman *not said here* |  |  |  |  | deaf *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **be** |  | boatman *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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