---
title: But the king would not hear a word; he drove them away, telling them… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But the king would not hear a word; he drove them away, telling them that if they did not get it very soon it would cost them their heads. Who acts: king, brothers, word. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 29, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of 
---

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 29, sentence 34

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But the king would not hear a word; he drove them away, telling them that if they did not get it very soon it would cost them their heads.

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**Who acts:** king, brothers, word · **What happens:** not hear, drive away, tell, not get, cost · **To what, where:** word, brothers, heads · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 29. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (king, brothers, word), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Checked tree.** This sentence is in the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3 (`gutenberg:pg5615:2879`): parsed by Mova, then checked and patched by a teacher model under UD validation gates — Mova annot: Rust (en) → Claude Opus (medium) patches; gates UD 2.18.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg5615:29:34
# text = But the king would not hear a word; he drove them away, telling them that if they did not get it very soon it would cost them their heads.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
4	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
5	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
6	hear	hear	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	_
9	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	11	punct	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	drove	drive	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	parataxis	_	_
12	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	_
13	away	away	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	telling	tell	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	11	advcl	_	_
16	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
18	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	22	mark	_	_
19	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
20	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
21	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	22	advmod	_	_
22	get	get	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	advcl	_	_
23	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	_
24	very	very	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	_
25	soon	soon	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	22	advmod	_	_
26	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
27	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
28	cost	cost	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	ccomp	_	_
29	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	iobj	_	_
30	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	31	nmod:poss	_	_
31	heads	head	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	28	obj	_	_
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **hear** | would | the king | a word |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer word=Stimulus |
| 2 | **drive away** | past | king | brothers *= brother* |  |  |  | away *property* | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Theme |
| 3 | **tell** *speech: assert* | gerund | king *not said here* |  | brothers *= brother* |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent they=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 4 | **not** **get** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · do-support | brothers *= brother* | word |  |  |  | soon *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer it=Stimulus |
| 5 | **cost** | would | word | brothers's heads | brothers *= brother* |  |  |  | vn cost-54.2 «NP V NP NP»: agent=Theme they=Beneficiary head=Value |

<!-- .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 Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 5615 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** the tales treebank of Mova corpus 0.3, Apache-2.0 OR MIT. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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