---
title: The King grew as white as a sheet when he heard the Prince’s story,… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The King grew as white as a sheet when he heard the Prince’s story, and said, ‘Woe is me, my son! Who acts: King, Woe. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, The Biter Bit, part 2, sentence 46

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The King grew as white as a sheet when he heard the Prince’s story, and said, ‘Woe is me, my son!

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**Who acts:** King, Woe · **What happens:** grow, hear, say, be · **To what, where:** story, me · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Biter Bit, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (King, Woe), 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:pg7277:27:46
# text = The King grew as white as a sheet when he heard the Prince’s story, and said, ‘Woe is me, my son!
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
3	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	as	as	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	xcomp	_	_
6	as	as	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	sheet	sheet	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
9	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	11	advmod	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	advcl	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	Prince	Prince	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	15	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	’s	's	PART	POS	_	13	case	_	_
15	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
18	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
20	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	23	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	Woe	woe	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	nsubj	_	_
22	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	23	cop	_	_
23	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
25	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow** | past | the King |  |  |  |  | white *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **hear** | past | KING | the Prince's story |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer story=Stimulus |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **is a** | present | Woe | me |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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 Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 7277 (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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