---
title: "My lad," he said, "you have done a piece of work of which the great… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: "My lad," he said, "you have done a piece of work of which the greatest artists would be proud. Who acts: bade, you, greatest artists. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Antonio Canova., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, Antonio Canova., sentence 59

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"My lad," he said, "you have done a piece of work of which the greatest artists would be proud.

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**Who acts:** bade, you, greatest artists · **What happens:** say, do, be · **To what, where:** piece · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Antonio Canova.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (bade, you, greatest artists), 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:pg18442:54:59
# text = "My lad," he said, "you have done a piece of work of which the greatest artists would be proud.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	lad	lad	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
9	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
12	done	do	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	7	ccomp	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	piece	piece	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
16	work	work	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	_
17	of	of	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	24	obl	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	greatest	great	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	21	amod	_	_
21	artists	artist	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nsubj	_	_
22	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
23	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	24	cop	_	_
24	proud	proud	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | bade |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **do** *in a quote* | present · perfect | you | a piece of work |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent piece=Eventuality |
| 3 | **is** *in a quote* | would | the greatest artists |  |  |  |  | of work; proud *property* | tree rules |

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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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- ← previous: [sentence 58](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/54/58/)
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- ↑ back to [Antonio Canova.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/54/)