---
title: “I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn’t… — Alice's Adventures in Wonderland · tree and pragmatics
description: “I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn’t know that cats _could_ grin.” Who acts: Duchess, Cheshire cats. A sentence of «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper, sentence 45

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“I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn’t know that cats \_could\_ grin.”

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**Who acts:** Duchess, Cheshire cats · **What happens:** not know, grin · **To what, where:** fact

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This is a sentence of «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Duchess, Cheshire cats), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**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 {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg11:7:45
# text = “I didn’t know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn’t know that cats _could_ grin.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
7	Cheshire	Cheshire	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	8	compound	_	_
8	cats	cat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj	_	_
9	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	10	advmod	_	_
10	grinned	grin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	_
12	in	in	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	fact	fact	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
15	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
16	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	18	advmod	_	_
18	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	conj	_	_
19	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	22	mark	_	_
20	cats	cat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nsubj	_	_
21	_	_	PUNCT	NFP	_	20	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	_	_	PUNCT	NFP	_	24	punct	_	_
24	grin	grin	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **know** *in a quote* | past · do-support | Duchess |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 2 | **grin** *in a quote* | past | Cheshire cats |  |  |  |  | always *property* | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **not** **know** *in a quote* | past · do-support | Duchess |  |  | fact |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |

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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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**Text:** «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Project Gutenberg book 11 (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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