---
title: 'You had better not kill me, for, if you do, I will turn you into a… — The Orange Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: 'You had better not kill me, for, if you do, I will turn you into a fish yourself!' Who acts: You, I. A sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 25, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 25, sentence 8

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'You had better not kill me, for, if you do, I will turn you into a fish yourself!'

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**Who acts:** You, I · **What happens:** have, not kill, do, turn · **To what, where:** me, you

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This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 25. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (You, I), 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:pg3027:25:8
# text = 'You had better not kill me, for, if you do, I will turn you into a fish yourself!'
1	'	'	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	You	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	better	well	ADV	RBR	Degree=Cmp	6	advmod	_	_
5	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	6	advmod	_	_
6	kill	kill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	_
7	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
9	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
11	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
12	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	do	do	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	17	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
15	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
16	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
17	turn	turn	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	conj	_	_
18	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	into	into	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	_
22	yourself	yourself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=2|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | You |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **not** **kill** | infinitive | You *not said here* | me |  |  |  | well *property* | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent i=Theme |
| 3 | **do** *a condition, not said to happen* | present | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **turn** | future | I | you |  |  |  | into a fish *result*; yourself *obl* | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V NP PP.result»: agent=Agent you=Theme into fish=Result |

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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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