---
title: While I was sleeping a spark from the fire lighted on the hair, whic… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: While I was sleeping a spark from the fire lighted on the hair, which was burnt up in a moment. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Finest Liar in the World, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Finest Liar in the World, sentence 54

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While I was sleeping a spark from the fire lighted on the hair, which was burnt up in a moment.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** sleep, light, burnt up · **To what, where:** spark, fire, hair

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Finest Liar in the World. 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:pg641:3:54
# text = While I was sleeping a spark from the fire lighted on the hair, which was burnt up in a moment.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	sleeping	sleep	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	spark	spark	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	from	from	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
10	lighted	light	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	9	acl	_	_
11	on	on	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	hair	hair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	17	nsubj:pass	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux:pass	_	_
17	burnt	burnt	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	acl:relcl	_	_
18	up	up	ADP	RP	_	17	compound:prt	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	moment	moment	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sleep** | past · progressive | I | a spark |  | the fire |  |  | vn snooze-40.4-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent spark=Theme |
| 2 | **light** | participle |  | the fire *not said here* |  | the hair |  |  | vn preparing-26.3-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **burnt up** | past · passive |  | the hair |  |  | moment |  | 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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