---
title: But about midnight the wind blew so sharp, that in spite of the fire… — Grimm's Fairy Stories · tree and pragmatics
description: But about midnight the wind blew so sharp, that in spite of the fire he could not keep himself warm. Who acts: wind. A sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Oh, If I Could But Shiver!, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimm's Fairy Stories, Oh, If I Could But Shiver!, sentence 55

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But about midnight the wind blew so sharp, that in spite of the fire he could not keep himself warm.

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**Who acts:** wind · **What happens:** blow, not keep, spite · **To what, where:** wind, spite, fire

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This is a sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Oh, If I Could But Shiver!. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wind), 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:pg11027:9:55
# text = But about midnight the wind blew so sharp, that in spite of the fire he could not keep himself warm.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
2	about	about	ADV	RB	_	3	advmod	_	_
3	midnight	midnight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	wind	wind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
6	blew	blow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	so	so	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
8	sharp	sharp	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
10	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	19	mark	_	_
11	in	in	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	spite	spite	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obl	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod	_	_
16	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
17	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	19	advmod	_	_
19	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	advcl	_	_
20	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	19	obj	_	_
21	warm	warm	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **blow** | past | the wind |  |  |  | midnight | sharp *property* | vn split-23.2 «NP V apart»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **not** **keep** | could | wind | wind |  | spite of the fire |  | warm *property* | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent himself=Theme in spite=Location |
| 3 | **spite** |  |  | the fire |  |  |  |  | nom spite «feeling transitive»: of=patient |

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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:** «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 11027 (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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