---
title: “This at first seemed a great misfortune, for I knew a one-legged ma… — The Wonderful Wizard of Oz · tree and pragmatics
description: “This at first seemed a great misfortune, for I knew a one-legged man could not do very well as a wood-chopper. Who acts: This, old woman, legged man. A sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter V. The Rescue of the Tin Woodman, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of
---

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# The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chapter V. The Rescue of the Tin Woodman, sentence 76

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“This at first seemed a great misfortune, for I knew a one-legged man could not do very well as a wood-chopper.

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**Who acts:** This, old woman, legged man · **What happens:** seem, know, not do · **To what, where:** great misfortune · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter V. The Rescue of the Tin Woodman. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (This, old woman, legged man), 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:pg55:7:76
# text = “This at first seemed a great misfortune, for I knew a one-legged man could not do very well as a wood-chopper.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	This	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	nsubj	_	_
3	at	at	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
4	first	first	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	5	obl	_	_
5	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	misfortune	misfortune	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
11	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
14	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	16	nummod	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	legged	legged	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
18	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	20	aux	_	_
19	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	20	advmod	_	_
20	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	ccomp	_	_
21	very	very	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	well	well	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	20	advmod	_	_
23	as	as	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
25	wood	wood	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	25	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	chopper	chopper	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **seem** *in a quote* | past | This | a great misfortune |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme misfortune=Attribute |
| 2 | **know** *in a quote* | past | the old woman *= woman* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 3 | **not** **do** *in a quote* | could | a legged man |  |  |  |  | as a wood chopper; well *property* | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: 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 Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Project Gutenberg book 55 (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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