---
title: But if the worst comes to the worst, you shall not die for me. — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: But if the worst comes to the worst, you shall not die for me. Who acts: worst, you. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Three Answers., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/10/13/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Fifty Famous Stories Retold](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/) / [II. the Three Answers.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/10/) / 13

# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, II. the Three Answers., sentence 13

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But if the worst comes to the worst, you shall not die for me.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** worst, you · **What happens:** come, not die · **To what, where:** worst

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Three Answers.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (worst, you), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg18442:10:13
# text = But if the worst comes to the worst, you shall not die for me.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
2	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	worst	bad	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	5	nsubj	_	_
5	comes	come	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
6	to	to	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	worst	bad	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
10	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
11	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
12	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	13	advmod	_	_
13	die	die	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
14	for	for	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** *a condition, not said to happen* | present | the worst |  |  | the worst |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to bad=Initial\_Location |
| 2 | **not** **die** | shall | you |  |  |  |  | for me | vn long-32.2 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Pivot for i=Theme |

<!-- .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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/10/12/)
- next →: [sentence 14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/10/14/)
- ↑ back to [II. the Three Answers.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/10/)