---
title: “Tell it to me,” said the Nightingale, “I am not afraid.” — The Happy Prince, and Other Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Tell it to me,” said the Nightingale, “I am not afraid.” Who acts: Nightingale. A sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Happy Prince, and Other Tales, Opening, part 2, sentence 108

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“Tell it to me,” said the Nightingale, “I am not afraid.”

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**Who acts:** Nightingale · **What happens:** tell, say, not be · **To what, where:** way, Nightingale · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Nightingale), 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:pg902:2:108
# text = “Tell it to me,” said the Nightingale, “I am not afraid.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	ccomp	_	_
3	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	obj	_	_
4	to	to	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	Nightingale	Nightingale	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
12	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
14	am	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	16	cop	_	_
15	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	afraid	afraid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	16	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | infinitive |  | way | the Nightingale *= nightingale* |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent it=Topic to i=Recipient |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the Nightingale |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **not** **is** *in a quote* | present | the Nightingale *= nightingale* |  |  |  |  | afraid *property* | 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:** «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Project Gutenberg book 902 (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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