---
title: “This man means to annoy us; he is an evil man.” — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: “This man means to annoy us; he is an evil man.” Who acts: man. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Story of Old China, part 1, sentence 33

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“This man means to annoy us; he is an evil man.”

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**Who acts:** man · **What happens:** mean, annoy, be · **To what, where:** us, evil man

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (man), 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:pg75089:17:33
# text = “This man means to annoy us; he is an evil man.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	This	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	det	_	_
3	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	means	mean	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	annoy	annoy	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	_
7	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
10	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	13	cop	_	_
11	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	evil	evil	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **mean** *in a quote* | present | this man |  |  |  |  |  | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **annoy** *not said to happen, in a quote* | to-infinitive | this man *not said here* | us |  |  |  |  | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus we=Experiencer |
| 3 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | man | a evil man |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

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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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