---
title: “I dare say that if I knew him I should not be his friend at all. — The Happy Prince, and Other Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “I dare say that if I knew him I should not be his friend at all. Who acts: Rocket. A sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 6, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Happy Prince, and Other Tales, Opening, part 6, sentence 82

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“I dare say that if I knew him I should not be his friend at all.

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**Who acts:** Rocket · **What happens:** dare, say, know, not be · **To what, where:** Rocket, friend, all · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Happy Prince, and Other Tales» by Oscar Wilde, Opening, part 6. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Rocket), 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:pg902:6:82
# text = “I dare say that if I knew him I should not be his friend at all.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	dare	dare	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	say	say	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	ccomp	_	_
5	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
6	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	knew	know	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	ccomp	_	_
9	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	obj	_	_
10	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
11	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
12	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	15	advmod	_	_
13	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	cop	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	friend	friend	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	ccomp	_	_
16	at	at	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **dare** *in a quote* | present | the Rocket *= rocket* |  |  |  |  |  | vn urge-58.1-1 «NP V NP S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | infinitive | the Rocket *= rocket* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **know** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | past | the Rocket *= rocket* | Rocket |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer he=Stimulus |
| 4 | **not** **is a** *in a quote* | should | the Rocket *= rocket* | Rocket's friend |  | all |  |  | 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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