---
title: ‘Is this story true?’ said the father, turning to his sons. — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Is this story true?’ said the father, turning to his sons. Who acts: story. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Halfman, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Story of Halfman, sentence 157

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‘Is this story true?’ said the father, turning to his sons.

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**Who acts:** story · **What happens:** be, say, turn · **To what, where:** father · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Story of Halfman. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (story), 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:pg641:41:157
# text = ‘Is this story true?’ said the father, turning to his sons.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
3	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	4	det	_	_
4	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	true	true	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	turning	turn	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
13	to	to	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	sons	son	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | this story |  |  |  |  | true *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the father |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent father=Topic |
| 3 | **turn** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | to father's sons *result* | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V PP.result»: agent=Theme to son=Result |

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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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