---
title: ‘I have nobody to help me,’ answered the prince, ‘but my own poor he… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘I have nobody to help me,’ answered the prince, ‘but my own poor head.’ Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Grateful Prince, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Grateful Prince, part 2, sentence 45

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‘I have nobody to help me,’ answered the prince, ‘but my own poor head.’

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** have, help, answer · **To what, where:** nobody, me, prince · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Grateful Prince, 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 (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:pg641:10:45
# text = ‘I have nobody to help me,’ answered the prince, ‘but my own poor head.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	have	have	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	ccomp	_	_
4	nobody	nobody	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	3	obj	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	acl	_	_
7	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
10	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	prince	prince	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
14	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
16	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
17	own	own	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
18	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	19	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | present | I | nobody |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent nobody=Patient |
| 2 | **help** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* | nobody *not said here* | me |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Beneficiary |
| 3 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past |  |  | the prince |  |  |  | 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 Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 641 (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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