---
title: God only knows what I had to endure. — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: God only knows what I had to endure. Who acts: God, I. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Literary Glory, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, Literary Glory, sentence 16

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God only knows what I had to endure.

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**Who acts:** God, I · **What happens:** know, have, endure · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Literary Glory. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (God, I), 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:pg75089:13:16
# text = God only knows what I had to endure.
1	God	God	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
2	only	only	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	knows	know	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	6	obj	_	_
5	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	ccomp	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	endure	endure	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **know** | present | God |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 2 | **have** | past | I |  |  |  |  | what *obj* | tree rules |
| 3 | **endure** | to-infinitive | I *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn exist-47.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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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