---
title: He ran as fast as he could, from one street to another, trying to fi… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: He ran as fast as he could, from one street to another, trying to find those that were paved with gold. Who acts: lad. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, I. the City., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, I. the City., sentence 15

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He ran as fast as he could, from one street to another, trying to find those that were paved with gold.

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**Who acts:** lad · **What happens:** run, try, find, pave · **To what, where:** one street, those

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, I. the City.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lad), 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:pg18442:49:15
# text = He ran as fast as he could, from one street to another, trying to find those that were paved with gold.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	ran	run	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	as	as	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	fast	fast	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	2	advmod	_	_
5	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	7	mark	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	from	from	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	11	nummod	_	_
11	street	street	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	another	another	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	11	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
15	trying	try	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	xcomp	_	_
18	those	that	PRON	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	17	obj	_	_
19	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	21	nsubj:pass	_	_
20	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	aux:pass	_	_
21	paved	pave	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	18	acl:relcl	_	_
22	with	with	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
23	gold	gold	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **run** | past | lad |  |  | one street to another |  | fast *property* | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme from street=Trajectory |
| 2 | **try** | gerund | lad *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn try-61.1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **find** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | lad *not said here* | those |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent that=Topic |
| 4 | **pave** | past · passive |  |  |  |  |  | with gold | vn fill-9.8-1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: subject=Destination with gold=Theme |

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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:** «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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