---
title: 'If you had only listened to us,' they cried, 'he would be alive now. — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: 'If you had only listened to us,' they cried, 'he would be alive now. Who acts: you, they, he. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 22, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 22, sentence 1

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'If you had only listened to us,' they cried, 'he would be alive now.

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**Who acts:** you, they, he · **What happens:** listen, cry, be · **To what, where:** us

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 22. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, they, he), 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:pg3027:22:1
# text = 'If you had only listened to us,' they cried, 'he would be alive now.
1	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
3	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
4	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
5	only	only	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	listened	listen	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	12	advcl	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	12	punct	_	_
11	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	cried	cry	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
14	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
16	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
17	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	18	cop	_	_
18	alive	alive	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	parataxis	_	_
19	now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	18	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **listen** *a condition, not said to happen* | past · perfect | you |  | us |  |  |  | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent to we=Theme |
| 2 | **cry** *speech: express* | past | they |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is** | would | he |  |  |  | now | alive *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:** «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3027 (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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