Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter VII, sentence 2

There were hills and valleys there, and woods and streams, but in whatever direction I went I came always to a cliff, so tall it seemed to lean against the sky, and so straight that even a goat would not have imagined to climb it.”

Who acts: hills, I, it · What happens: be, go, come, seem, lean, not imagine · To what, where: direction, cliff, sky, goat

This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VII. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hills, I, it), 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	There	there	PRON	PronType=Dem	2 were	expl
2	were	be	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	hills	hill	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 were	nsubj
4	and	and	CCONJ	_	5 valleys	cc
5	valleys	valley	NOUN	Number=Plur	3 hills	conj
6	there	there	ADV	PronType=Dem	2 were	advmod
7	,	,	PUNCT	_	9 woods	punct
8	and	and	CCONJ	_	9 woods	cc
9	woods	wood	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 were	parataxis
10	and	and	CCONJ	_	11 streams	cc
11	streams	stream	NOUN	Number=Plur	9 woods	conj
12	,	,	PUNCT	_	18 went	punct
13	but	but	CCONJ	_	18 went	cc
14	in	in	ADP	_	16 direction	case
15	whatever	whatever	DET	PronType=Int	16 direction	det
16	direction	direction	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 went	obl
17	I	I	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs	18 went	nsubj
18	went	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 were	conj
19	I	I	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs	20 came	nsubj
20	came	come	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	18 went	conj
21	always	always	ADV	PronType=Tot	20 came	advmod
22	to	to	ADP	_	24 cliff	case
23	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	24 cliff	det
24	cliff	cliff	NOUN	Number=Sing	20 came	obl
25	,	,	PUNCT	_	27 tall	punct
26	so	so	ADV	_	27 tall	advmod
27	tall	tall	ADJ	Degree=Pos	20 came	parataxis
28	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	29 seemed	nsubj
29	seemed	seem	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	27 tall	acl:relcl
30	to	to	PART	_	31 lean	mark
31	lean	lean	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	29 seemed	xcomp
32	against	against	ADP	_	34 sky	case
33	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	34 sky	det
34	sky	sky	NOUN	Number=Sing	31 lean	obl
35	,	,	PUNCT	_	38 straight	punct
36	and	and	CCONJ	_	38 straight	cc
37	so	so	ADV	_	38 straight	advmod
38	straight	straight	ADJ	Degree=Pos	18 went	parataxis
39	that	that	SCONJ	_	46 imagined	mark
40	even	even	ADV	_	42 goat	advmod
41	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	42 goat	det
42	goat	goat	NOUN	Number=Sing	46 imagined	nsubj:pass
43	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	46 imagined	aux
44	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	46 imagined	advmod
45	have	have	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	46 imagined	aux
46	imagined	imagine	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	38 straight	advcl
47	to	to	PART	_	48 climb	mark
48	climb	climb	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	46 imagined	xcomp
49	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	48 climb	obj
50	.	.	PUNCT	_	2 were	punct
51	”	"	PUNCT	_	2 were	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	be	past	hills and valleys		there; there		vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	go	past	I		whatever direction		vn occur-48.3-2 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme in direction=Location
3	come	past	I		a cliff	always property	vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial_location»: agent=Theme to cliff=Initial_Location
4	seem	past	it				vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute
5	lean	to-infinitive			the sky		vn assuming_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent against sky=Location
6	not imagine	would · perfect · passive		a goat			tree rules
7	climb	to-infinitive		goat			vn run-51.3.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Initial_Location it=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: «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Project Gutenberg book 2892 (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/pg2892/39/2/