---
title: ‘My children,’ she said, ‘all the years that I have lived in the wor… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘My children,’ she said, ‘all the years that I have lived in the world, I have never heard of a shift spun from nettles. Who acts: children, years, I. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nettle Spinner, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/42/53/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Red Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/) / [The Nettle Spinner](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/42/) / 53

# The Red Fairy Book, The Nettle Spinner, sentence 53

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘My children,’ she said, ‘all the years that I have lived in the world, I have never heard of a shift spun from nettles.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** children, years, I · **What happens:** say, live, not hear, spin · **To what, where:** world, shift, nettles · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Nettle Spinner. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (children, years, I), 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:pg540:42:53
# text = ‘My children,’ she said, ‘all the years that I have lived in the world, I have never heard of a shift spun from nettles.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
9	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	12	det:predet	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	years	year	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obl	_	_
13	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	16	nsubj	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
15	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
16	lived	live	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	acl:relcl	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
21	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	24	nsubj	_	_
22	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
23	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	24	advmod	_	_
24	heard	hear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	7	conj	_	_
25	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	shift	shift	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	obl	_	_
28	spun	spin	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	27	acl	_	_
29	from	from	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	nettles	nettle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | My children |  |  |  | year |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **live** | present · perfect | all years |  |  | the world |  |  | vn lodge-46 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in world=Location |
| 3 | **not** **hear** | present · perfect | I |  |  |  |  | of a shift | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V PP.stimulus»: agent=Experiencer of shift=Stimulus |
| 4 | **spin** | participle |  | a shift *not said here* |  | nettles |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V PP.trajectory»: agent=Theme from nettle=Trajectory |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 52](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/42/52/)
- next →: [sentence 54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/42/54/)
- ↑ back to [The Nettle Spinner](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg540/42/)