---
title: “I cannot tell,” was the answer, “for I have never been to the Emera… — The Wonderful Wizard of Oz · tree and pragmatics
description: “I cannot tell,” was the answer, “for I have never been to the Emerald City. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion, sentence 7

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“I cannot tell,” was the answer, “for I have never been to the Emerald City.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** not tell, be, not be · **To what, where:** answer · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Wonderful Wizard of Oz» by L. Frank Baum, Chapter VI. The Cowardly Lion. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (I), 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:pg55:8:7
# text = “I cannot tell,” was the answer, “for I have never been to the Emerald City.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	csubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	cop	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	answer	answer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	for	for	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
15	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
16	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	21	advmod	_	_
17	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	21	cop	_	_
18	to	to	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	Emerald	Emerald	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	compound	_	_
21	City	City	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **tell** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | can | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **be** *speech: assert* | past |  | the answer |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **not** **is** *in a quote* | present · perfect | I |  |  |  |  | for the Emerald City | 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 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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