---
title: ‘Then you are an orphan?’ asked the stranger. — The Violet Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘Then you are an orphan?’ asked the stranger. Who acts: you. 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 44

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‘Then you are an orphan?’ asked the stranger.

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**Who acts:** you · **What happens:** be, ask · **To what, where:** stranger

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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 (you), 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:pg641:9:44
# text = ‘Then you are an orphan?’ asked the stranger.
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	advmod	_	_
3	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
4	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
5	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	orphan	orphan	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	6	punct	_	_
9	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	stranger	stranger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | present | you |  |  |  | then | orphan *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past |  |  | the stranger |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent stranger=Recipient |

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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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