---
title: He sat down by the door of a fine house, and wished that he was back… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: He sat down by the door of a fine house, and wished that he was back again in the little town where he was born. Who acts: Dick. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Kitchen., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, II. the Kitchen., sentence 2

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He sat down by the door of a fine house, and wished that he was back again in the little town where he was born.

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**Who acts:** Dick · **What happens:** sit down, wish, be, bear · **To what, where:** little town, Dick

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, II. the Kitchen.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Dick), 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:pg18442:50:2
# text = He sat down by the door of a fine house, and wished that he was back again in the little town where he was born.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	down	down	ADP	RP	_	2	compound:prt	_	_
4	by	by	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	door	door	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
7	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	fine	fine	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	wished	wish	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
14	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
16	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	cop	_	_
17	back	back	ADV	RB	_	13	advmod	_	_
18	again	again	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	_
23	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	26	advmod	_	_
24	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj:pass	_	_
25	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	aux:pass	_	_
26	born	bear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	22	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit down** | past | Dick |  |  |  |  | by the door of a fine house | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent by door=Location |
| 2 | **wish** | past | Dick *not said here* |  |  | the little town |  |  | vn wish-62 «NP V for NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |
| 3 | **is** | past | Dick |  |  |  | again | back *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **bear** | past · passive |  | Dick |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1-1 «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:** «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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