---
title: Yen Sung, almost in despair, went to his steward and told him his di… — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: Yen Sung, almost in despair, went to his steward and told him his dilemma. Who acts: Yen. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Chinese Tea-house Story, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Chinese Tea-house Story, sentence 6

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Yen Sung, almost in despair, went to his steward and told him his dilemma.

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**Who acts:** Yen · **What happens:** go, tell · **To what, where:** steward, dilemma, Yen · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Chinese Tea-house Story. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Yen), 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:pg75089:10:6
# text = Yen Sung, almost in despair, went to his steward and told him his dilemma.
1	Yen	Yen	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
2	Sung	Sung	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	1	flat	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
4	almost	almost	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
5	in	in	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	despair	despair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
8	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	to	to	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
11	steward	steward	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	conj	_	_
14	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	iobj	_	_
15	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	dilemma	dilemma	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **go** | past | Yen |  |  | Yen's steward |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to steward=Initial\_Location |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | Yen *not said here* | Yen's dilemma | Yen |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent he=Recipient dilemma=Topic |

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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:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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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