The Lilac Fairy Book, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 1, sentence 12

The best plan seems to be to answer that I have entirely abandoned mere literature, and am contemplating a book on ‘The Causes of Early Blight in the Potato,’ a melancholy circumstance which threatens to deprive us of our chief esculent root.

Who acts: best plan, I, melancholy circumstance · What happens: seem, be, abandon, contemplate, threaten, deprive · To what, where: mere literature, book, Causes, us

This is a sentence of «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Lilac Fairy Book, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (best plan, I, melancholy circumstance), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 plan	det
2	best	good	ADJ	Degree=Sup	3 plan	amod
3	plan	plan	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 seems	nsubj
4	seems	seem	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	8 answer	mark
6	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	8 answer	cop
7	to	to	PART	_	8 answer	mark
8	answer	answer	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 seems	xcomp
9	that	that	SCONJ	_	13 abandoned	mark
10	I	I	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs	13 abandoned	nsubj
11	have	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	13 abandoned	aux
12	entirely	entirely	ADV	_	13 abandoned	advmod
13	abandoned	abandon	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	8 answer	advcl
14	mere	mere	ADJ	Degree=Pos	15 literature	amod
15	literature	literature	NOUN	Number=Sing	13 abandoned	obj
16	,	,	PUNCT	_	19 contemplating	punct
17	and	and	CCONJ	_	19 contemplating	cc
18	am	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	19 contemplating	aux
19	contemplating	contemplate	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	4 seems	conj
20	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	21 book	det
21	book	book	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 contemplating	obj
22	on	on	ADP	_	25 Causes	case
23	‘	'	PUNCT	_	25 Causes	punct
24	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	25 Causes	det
25	Causes	Cause	PROPN	Number=Plur	21 book	nmod
26	of	of	ADP	_	28 Blight	case
27	Early	early	ADJ	Degree=Pos	28 Blight	amod
28	Blight	blight	NOUN	Number=Sing	25 Causes	nmod
29	in	in	ADP	_	31 Potato	case
30	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	31 Potato	det
31	Potato	Potato	PROPN	Number=Sing	28 Blight	nmod
32	,	,	PUNCT	_	36 circumstance	punct
33	’	'	CCONJ	_	36 circumstance	cc
34	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	36 circumstance	det
35	melancholy	melancholy	NOUN	Number=Sing	36 circumstance	compound
36	circumstance	circumstance	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 contemplating	parataxis
37	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	38 threatens	nsubj
38	threatens	threaten	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	36 circumstance	acl:relcl
39	to	to	PART	_	40 deprive	mark
40	deprive	deprive	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	38 threatens	xcomp
41	us	we	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=1 PronType=Prs	40 deprive	obj
42	of	of	ADP	_	46 root	case
43	our	our	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=1 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	46 root	nmod:poss
44	chief	chief	ADJ	Degree=Pos	46 root	amod
45	esculent	esculent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	46 root	amod
46	root	root	NOUN	Number=Sing	40 deprive	obl
47	.	.	PUNCT	_	4 seems	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	seem	present	the best plan				vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute
2	is	to-infinitive	the best plan not said here			answer property	tree rules
3	abandon	present · perfect	I	mere literature		entirely property	vn leave-51.2 «NP V NP.initial_location»: agent=Theme literature=Source
4	contemplate	present · progressive	the best plan not said here	a book	the Causes of Early Blight in the Potato		tree rules
5	threaten	present	a melancholy circumstance				tree rules
6	deprive not said to happen	to-infinitive	a melancholy circumstance not said here	us		of our chief esculent root	vn deprive-10.6.2 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent we=Source of root=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.

Text: «The Lilac Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3454 (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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