---
title: Ah, me! that it should be my task to tell of this strange tragedy so… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: Ah, me! that it should be my task to tell of this strange tragedy so brief but terrible! Who acts: me. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, A Dreadful Vengeance, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, A Dreadful Vengeance, sentence 71

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Ah, me! that it should be my task to tell of this strange tragedy so brief but terrible!

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**Who acts:** me · **What happens:** be, tell · **To what, where:** task · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, A Dreadful Vengeance. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (me), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66819:30:71
# text = Ah, me! that it should be my task to tell of this strange tragedy so brief but terrible!
1	Ah	ah	INTJ	UH	_	3	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
5	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
6	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
7	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
8	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	cop	_	_
9	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	10	nmod:poss	_	_
10	task	task	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	acl	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	16	det	_	_
15	strange	strange	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	tragedy	tragedy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
17	so	so	ADV	RB	_	18	advmod	_	_
18	brief	brief	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
19	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	terrible	terrible	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | should | me | my task |  |  |  | doom *nsubj*; my *nmod:poss* | tree rules |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  | of this strange tragedy | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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 Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 66819 (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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