---
title: ‘It is better that one should die than two,’ said he. — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘It is better that one should die than two,’ said he. Who acts: one, Ritter. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, Mother Holle, part 2, sentence 8

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‘It is better that one should die than two,’ said he.

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**Who acts:** one, Ritter · **What happens:** be, die, say · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Mother Holle, 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 (one, Ritter), 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:pg540:45:8
# text = ‘It is better that one should die than two,’ said he.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	expl	_	_
3	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	better	good	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	0	root	_	_
5	that	that	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	6	det	_	_
6	one	one	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
7	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	die	die	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	csubj	_	_
9	than	than	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
13	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	conj	_	_
14	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present |  |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **die** | should | that one |  |  |  |  | than two | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Ritter |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |

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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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