---
title: Then a creak.", the whole class freezes, because short sentences slo… — Building tension and suspense · tree and pragmatics
description: Then a creak.", the whole class freezes, because short sentences slow time down and make every second feel important, like the ticking before a game show answer. Who acts: whole class, short sentences, second. A sentence of the lesson «Building tension and suspense» of the english course of Mova's p
---

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# Building tension and suspense, sentence 2

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Then a creak.", the whole class freezes, because short sentences slow time down and make every second feel important, like the ticking before a game show answer.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** whole class, short sentences, second · **What happens:** freeze, slow down, make, feel

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of the lesson «Building tension and suspense» of the english course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (whole class, short sentences, second), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = school:english:042-building-tension-and-suspense.lesson:2
# text = Then a creak.", the whole class freezes, because short sentences slow time down and make every second feel important, like the ticking before a game show answer.
# source = school lesson (ours)
# course = english
# lesson = 042-building-tension-and-suspense.lesson
# annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×2, R6-punct-agree ×1
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	3	advmod	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	creak	creak	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
4	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
5	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=10:punct
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	class	class	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
10	freezes	freeze	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	3	conj	_	_
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
12	because	because	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=19:mark
13	short	short	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
14	sentences	sentence	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nsubj	_	Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=19:nsubj
15	slow	slow	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	conj	_	_
16	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
17	down	down	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	19	cc	_	_
19	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	parataxis	_	_
20	every	every	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	21	det	_	_
21	second	second	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos|NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	22	nsubj	_	_
22	feel	feel	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	19	xcomp	_	_
23	important	important	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	xcomp	_	_
24	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	27	punct	_	_
25	like	like	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
26	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
27	ticking	ticking	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
28	before	before	ADP	IN	_	32	case	_	_
29	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	32	det	_	_
30	game	game	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	31	compound	_	_
31	show	show	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	compound	_	_
32	answer	answer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	nmod	_	_
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- sa -->
- form: statement
- act: narrate
- voice: character
- polarity: none
- teacher: kept the draft

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **freeze** *in a quote* | present | the whole class |  |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4-1 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **slow down** *in a quote* | infinitive | short sentences |  |  |  | time | down *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 3 | **make** *in a quote* | infinitive |  |  |  |  |  | like the ticking before a show answer | tree rules |
| 4 | **feel** *in a quote* | infinitive | every second |  |  |  |  | important *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |

<!-- .note -->
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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**Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:english:042-building-tension-and-suspense.lesson:2`.

**The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×2, R6-punct-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence.

See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/).

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