---
title: “Tell me,” Mongan commenced, “if you got a wish, what it is you woul… — Irish Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “Tell me,” Mongan commenced, “if you got a wish, what it is you would wish for?” Who acts: you, Mongan, wish. A sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XIX, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter XIX, sentence 34

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“Tell me,” Mongan commenced, “if you got a wish, what it is you would wish for?”

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**Who acts:** you, Mongan, wish · **What happens:** tell, commence, get, be · **To what, where:** hag, wish · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter XIX. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, Mongan, wish), 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:pg2892:90:34
# text = “Tell me,” Mongan commenced, “if you got a wish, what it is you would wish for?”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Tell	tell	VERB	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	2	iobj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
6	Mongan	Mongan	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	commenced	commence	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
9	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
11	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	got	get	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	wish	wish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
16	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	21	obj	_	_
17	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
18	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	21	cop	_	_
19	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
20	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	wish	wish	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	acl:relcl	_	_
22	for	for	ADP	IN	_	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	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 | **tell** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | imperative | you *not said here* |  | the hag *= hag* |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent i=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 2 | **commence** | past | Mongan |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 3 | **get** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | past | you | a wish |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer wish=Stimulus |
| 4 | **is** *in a quote* | would · present | wish |  |  |  |  | wish *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:** «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Project Gutenberg book 2892 (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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