---
title: The creature won’t understand a word about it, so I can just write w… — The Green Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The creature won’t understand a word about it, so I can just write what I choose.’ Who acts: creature, I. A sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jack My Hedgehog, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Green Fairy Book, Jack My Hedgehog, sentence 27

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The creature won’t understand a word about it, so I can just write what I choose.’

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**Who acts:** creature, I · **What happens:** not understand, write, choose · **To what, where:** word

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This is a sentence of «The Green Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Jack My Hedgehog. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (creature, I), 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:pg7277:48:27
# text = The creature won’t understand a word about it, so I can just write what I choose.’
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	creature	creature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	wo	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	understand	understand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	word	word	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
8	about	about	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
11	so	so	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
13	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	just	just	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
15	write	write	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	conj	_	_
16	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	18	obj	_	_
17	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	choose	choose	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	15	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **understand** | future | the creature | a word |  |  |  | about word | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer word=Stimulus |
| 2 | **write** | can | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **choose** | present | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Theme |

<!-- .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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