Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Sons of William the Conqueror., sentence 24

"Fair sir," said the wise man, "answer me this question: If, instead of being a boy, it had pleased God that you should be a bird, what kind of a bird would you rather be?"

Who acts: wise man, boy, that, you · What happens: say, answer, be, have · To what, where: question, wise man, pleased God, bird, kind · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Sons of William the Conqueror.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wise man, boy, that, you), 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	"	"	PUNCT	_	3 sir	punct
2	Fair	fair	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 sir	amod
3	sir	sir	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 said	ccomp
4	,	,	PUNCT	_	3 sir	punct
5	"	"	PUNCT	_	3 sir	punct
6	said	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	9 man	det
8	wise	wise	ADJ	Degree=Pos	9 man	amod
9	man	man	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 said	nsubj
10	,	,	PUNCT	_	12 answer	punct
11	"	"	PUNCT	_	12 answer	punct
12	answer	answer	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 said	conj
13	me	I	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs	12 answer	obj
14	this	this	DET	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	15 question	det
15	question	question	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 answer	obj
16	:	:	PUNCT	_	26 had	punct
17	If	if	SCONJ	_	26 had	mark
18	,	,	PUNCT	_	23 boy	punct
19	instead	instead	ADV	ExtPos=ADP	23 boy	case
20	of	of	ADP	_	19 instead	fixed
21	being	be	AUX	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	23 boy	cop
22	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	23 boy	det
23	boy	boy	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 had	nsubj
24	,	,	PUNCT	_	23 boy	punct
25	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	26 had	nsubj
26	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	6 said	ccomp
27	pleased	pleased	ADJ	Degree=Pos	28 God	amod
28	God	God	PROPN	Number=Sing	26 had	obj
29	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	34 bird	nsubj
30	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	34 bird	nsubj
31	should	should	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	34 bird	aux
32	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	34 bird	cop
33	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	34 bird	det
34	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 had	ccomp
35	,	,	PUNCT	_	37 kind	punct
36	what	what	DET	PronType=Int	37 kind	det
37	kind	kind	NOUN	Number=Sing	44 be	obl
38	of	of	ADP	_	40 bird	case
39	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	40 bird	det
40	bird	bird	NOUN	Number=Sing	37 kind	nmod
41	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	44 be	aux
42	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	44 be	nsubj
43	rather	rather	ADV	_	44 be	advmod
44	be	be	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	34 bird	conj
45	?	?	PUNCT	_	26 had	punct
46	"	"	PUNCT	_	26 had	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	other	roles by
1	say speech: ask	past	the wise man				vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	answer speech: assert in a quote	infinitive	the wise man not said here	this question	the wise man = man		vn reciprocate-112-1 «NP V NP PP»: agent=Agent i=Theme question=Eventuality
3	is in a quote	gerund				instead a boy	tree rules
4	have a condition, not said to happen, in a quote	past	a boy	pleased God			vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent god=Patient
5	is a in a quote	should	that	a bird			tree rules
6	be in a quote	would	you	what kind of a bird			vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=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: «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/6/24/