---
title: But she wanted a husband who could answer when he was spoken to, not… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: But she wanted a husband who could answer when he was spoken to, not one who would stand up stiffly and look respectable--that would be too dull. Who acts: princess, husband, one, that. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9, with its dependency tree and the 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/67/)

<!-- 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 Pink Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/) / [The Pink Fairy Book, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/) / 67

# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9, sentence 67

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But she wanted a husband who could answer when he was spoken to, not one who would stand up stiffly and look respectable--that would be too dull.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** princess, husband, one, that · **What happens:** want, answer, speak, stand up, look, be · **To what, where:** husband · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (princess, husband, one, that), 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:pg5615:9:67
# text = But she wanted a husband who could answer when he was spoken to, not one who would stand up stiffly and look respectable--that would be too dull.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	3	cc	_	_
2	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	wanted	want	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	husband	husband	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	obj	_	_
6	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	8	nsubj	_	_
7	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	answer	answer	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	acl:relcl	_	_
9	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	12	advmod	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux:pass	_	_
12	spoken	speak	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	8	advcl	_	_
13	to	to	ADP	IN	_	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	19	nsubj	_	_
17	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	19	nsubj	_	_
18	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
19	stand	stand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
20	up	up	ADP	RP	_	19	compound:prt	_	_
21	stiffly	stiffly	ADV	RB	_	19	advmod	_	_
22	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
23	look	look	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	conj	_	_
24	respectable	respectable	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	30	nsubj	_	_
27	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	30	aux	_	_
28	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	30	cop	_	_
29	too	too	ADV	RB	_	30	advmod	_	_
30	dull	dull	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **want** | past | princess | a husband |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **answer** *speech: assert* | could | a husband |  |  |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **speak** *speech: other* | past · passive |  | husband |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **stand up** *not said to happen* | would | one |  |  |  |  | stiffly *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **look** | infinitive | one *not said here* |  |  |  |  | respectable *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |
| 6 | **is** | would | that |  |  |  |  | dull *property* | tree rules |

<!-- .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 Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 5615 (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 66](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/66/)
- next →: [sentence 68](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/68/)
- ↑ back to [The Pink Fairy Book, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/9/)