---
title: It was as if he had been clipped at every joint. — Peter Pan · tree and pragmatics
description: It was as if he had been clipped at every joint. A sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter XIV. THE PIRATE SHIP, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Peter Pan, Chapter XIV. THE PIRATE SHIP, sentence 143

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It was as if he had been clipped at every joint.

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**What happens:** clip · **To what, where:** head, joint

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This is a sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter XIV. THE PIRATE SHIP. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: 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:pg16:15:143
# text = It was as if he had been clipped at every joint.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj:pass	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux:pass	_	_
3	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
4	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
6	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
7	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	8	aux:pass	_	_
8	clipped	clip	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
9	at	at	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	every	every	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	11	det	_	_
11	joint	joint	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **clip** | past · perfect · passive |  | head |  | every joint |  |  | vn cut-21.1-1 «NP V NP»: subject=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:** «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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