---
title: “I am but a poor lone woman, living my life quietly. — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: “I am but a poor lone woman, living my life quietly. Who acts: Yü. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Story of Old China, part 4, sentence 128

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“I am but a poor lone woman, living my life quietly.

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**Who acts:** Yü · **What happens:** be, live · **To what, where:** poor lone woman, life

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Yü), 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:pg75089:20:128
# text = “I am but a poor lone woman, living my life quietly.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
3	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
4	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
6	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
7	lone	lone	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
10	living	live	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	conj	_	_
11	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
13	quietly	quietly	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | Yü | a poor lone woman |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **live** *in a quote* | gerund | Yü *not said here* | my life |  |  |  | quietly *property* | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme life=Location |

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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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