Exam question 1 · Andersen's Tales, The Story of a Mother: Death carries off…

In the context of the passage, what is the chief purpose of the mother's threat to tear up the flowers?

Mova's choice: option 4 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: passage · What happens: be, tear up · To what, where: chief purpose, flowers

This is exam question 1 of lesson 996 «Andersen's Tales, The Story of a Mother: Death carries off the child» of the books course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	In	in	ADP	_	3 context	case
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 context	det
3	context	context	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
4	of	of	ADP	_	6 passage	case
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 passage	det
6	passage	passage	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 context	nmod
7	,	,	PUNCT	_	12 purpose	punct
8	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	12 purpose	nsubj
9	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	12 purpose	cop
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 purpose	det
11	chief	chief	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 purpose	amod
12	purpose	purpose	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 passage	conj
13	of	of	ADP	_	17 threat	case
14	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	15 mother	det
15	mother	mother	NOUN	Number=Sing	17 threat	nmod:poss
16	's	's	PART	_	15 mother	case
17	threat	threat	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 purpose	nmod
18	to	to	PART	_	19 tear	mark
19	tear	tear	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	17 threat	acl
20	up	up	ADP	_	19 tear	compound:prt
21	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	22 flowers	det
22	flowers	flower	NOUN	Number=Plur	19 tear	obj
23	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 context	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	the passage and the chief purpose	the chief purpose				of the mother's threat	tree rules
2	tear up	to-infinitive	the passage and the chief purpose not said here	the flowers					vn run-51.3.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Initial_Location flower=Theme

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.

The options

Option 1

To scare Death

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 scare	mark
2	scare	scare	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	Death	Death	PROPN	Number=Sing	2 scare	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	scare	to-infinitive		Death					vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus death=Experiencer

Option 2

To show Death her grief and anger

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 show	mark
2	show	show	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	Death	Death	PROPN	Number=Sing	2 show	obj
4	her	her	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	5 grief	nmod:poss
5	grief	grief	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 show	obj
6	and	and	CCONJ	_	7 anger	cc
7	anger	anger	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 grief	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	show	to-infinitive		Death's grief and anger	Death				vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent death=Recipient grief=Topic

Option 3 · ✓ the right answer

To compel Death to return her child

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 compel	mark
2	compel	compel	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	Death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 compel	obj
4	to	to	PART	_	5 return	mark
5	return	return	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 compel	xcomp
6	her	her	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	7 child	nmod:poss
7	child	child	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 return	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	compel	to-infinitive		Death					vn compel-59.1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent death=Patient clause=Result
2	return	to-infinitive		her child					vn send-11.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent child=Theme

Option 4 · ← Mova's choice

To free the flowers

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	To	to	PART	_	2 free	mark
2	free	free	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 flowers	amod
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 flowers	det
4	flowers	flower	NOUN	Number=Plur	root	root

The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/books/996-pg27200-part207/e1/