---
title: “I wish he had been a white rat,” said Nibs. — Peter Pan · tree and pragmatics
description: “I wish he had been a white rat,” said Nibs. Who acts: Nibs, Curly. A sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter XI. WENDY’S STORY, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Peter Pan, Chapter XI. WENDY’S STORY, sentence 4

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“I wish he had been a white rat,” said Nibs.

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**Who acts:** Nibs, Curly · **What happens:** wish, be, say · **To what, where:** white rat · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter XI. WENDY’S STORY. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Nibs, Curly), 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:pg16:12:4
# text = “I wish he had been a white rat,” said Nibs.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	wish	wish	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	ccomp	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
5	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
6	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	9	cop	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	rat	rat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
12	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	Nibs	nib	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **wish** *in a quote* | present | Nibs *= nib* |  |  |  |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V for NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |
| 2 | **is a** *in a quote* | past · perfect | Curly | a white rat |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | Nibs |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |

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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:** «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Project Gutenberg book 16 (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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