---
title: ‘Well, my life is worth more than a thousand dogs,’ answered the kin… — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Well, my life is worth more than a thousand dogs,’ answered the king, ‘the welfare of my kingdom depends on me. Who acts: life, welfare. A sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Grateful Prince, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Violet Fairy Book, The Grateful Prince, part 1, sentence 17

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‘Well, my life is worth more than a thousand dogs,’ answered the king, ‘the welfare of my kingdom depends on me.

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**Who acts:** life, welfare · **What happens:** be, answer, depend · **To what, where:** king · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Violet Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Grateful Prince, 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 (life, welfare), 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:pg641:9:17
# text = ‘Well, my life is worth more than a thousand dogs,’ answered the king, ‘the welfare of my kingdom depends on me.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	7	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
6	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
7	worth	worth	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	ccomp	_	_
8	more	more	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp|ExtPos=ADV	11	advmod	_	_
9	than	than	ADP	IN	_	8	fixed	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	thousand	thousand	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	nummod	_	_
12	dogs	dog	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
15	answered	answer	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
16	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	king	king	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
19	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	25	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	welfare	welfare	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nsubj	_	_
22	of	of	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
23	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	24	nmod:poss	_	_
24	kingdom	kingdom	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nmod	_	_
25	depends	depend	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	17	acl:relcl	_	_
26	on	on	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | my life |  |  |  |  | worth *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **answer** *speech: assert* | past |  |  | the king |  |  |  | vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent king=Eventuality |
| 3 | **depend** | present | the welfare of my kingdom | the king *not said here* |  |  |  | on me | 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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