---
title: Don't you know that the bird will fly over the top of your wall, no… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: Don't you know that the bird will fly over the top of your wall, no matter how high you build it?" Who acts: you, bird. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Other Wise Men of Gotham., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, Other Wise Men of Gotham., sentence 47

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Don't you know that the bird will fly over the top of your wall, no matter how high you build it?"

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**Who acts:** you, bird · **What happens:** do, not know, fly, build · **To what, where:** top, bird · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Other Wise Men of Gotham.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, bird), 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:pg18442:15:47
# text = Don't you know that the bird will fly over the top of your wall, no matter how high you build it?"
1	Do	do	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
3	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	know	know	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	1	advcl	_	_
5	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
8	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	fly	fly	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	ccomp	_	_
10	over	over	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	top	top	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	wall	wall	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	18	punct	_	_
17	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	18	det	_	_
18	matter	matter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	_
19	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	20	advmod	_	_
20	high	high	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	xcomp	_	_
21	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	_
22	build	build	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	18	acl	_	_
23	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **do** | imperative | you *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **not** **know** | present | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 3 | **fly** | future | the bird |  |  | the top of your wall and no matter |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V NP.theme PP»: agent=Agent over top=Location |
| 4 | **build** | present | you | bird |  |  |  | high *property* | vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Product |

<!-- .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.

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**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.

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