---
title: My poor grandfather was so dumbfounded that he could only stand and… — Celtic Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: My poor grandfather was so dumbfounded that he could only stand and stare. Who acts: grandfather. A sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Andrew Coffey, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Celtic Fairy Tales, Andrew Coffey, sentence 24

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My poor grandfather was so dumbfounded that he could only stand and stare.

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**Who acts:** grandfather · **What happens:** dumbfound, stand, stare · **To what, where:** poor grandfather

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This is a sentence of «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Andrew Coffey. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (grandfather), 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:pg7885:27:24
# text = My poor grandfather was so dumbfounded that he could only stand and stare.
1	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
2	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	grandfather	grandfather	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj:pass	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux:pass	_	_
5	so	so	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	dumbfounded	dumbfound	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
7	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
8	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
9	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
10	only	only	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	stand	stand	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	xcomp	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	stare	stare	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **dumbfound** | past · passive |  | My poor grandfather |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **stand** | could | grandfather |  |  |  |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **stare** | infinitive | grandfather *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent |

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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:** «Celtic Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 7885 (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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