---
title: ‘For your sake, father, I would cut the devil himself into small bit… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘For your sake, father, I would cut the devil himself into small bits, or even become a devil myself. Who acts: I. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, part 1, sentence 63

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
‘For your sake, father, I would cut the devil himself into small bits, or even become a devil myself.

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**Who acts:** I · **What happens:** cut, become · **To what, where:** devil, small bits

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Girl Who Pretended to Be a Boy, part 1. 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:pg641:38:63
# text = ‘For your sake, father, I would cut the devil himself into small bits, or even become a devil myself.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	For	for	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
3	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	4	nmod:poss	_	_
4	sake	sake	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
6	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
8	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
9	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	cut	cut	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	devil	devil	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
13	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Emp|Reflex=Yes	12	nmod:unmarked	_	_
14	into	into	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	small	small	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	bits	bit	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
18	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
19	even	even	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
20	become	become	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	conj	_	_
21	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	devil	devil	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	xcomp	_	_
23	myself	myself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	22	nmod:unmarked	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **cut** | would | I | the devil  devil |  | small bits |  | for your sake and father | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP PP.product PP.beneficiary»: agent=Agent devil=Material for sake=Beneficiary into bit=Product |
| 2 | **become** | infinitive | I *not said here* | a devil  myself |  |  |  |  | vn become-109.1-1-1 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Patient |

<!-- .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 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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