---
title: Michael flung the contents of the cup behind him, sprang over the ta… — The Red Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Michael flung the contents of the cup behind him, sprang over the table, and fell at Lina’s feet. Who acts: Michael. A sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Red Fairy Book, The Twelve Dancing Princesses, sentence 190

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Michael flung the contents of the cup behind him, sprang over the table, and fell at Lina’s feet.

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**Who acts:** Michael · **What happens:** fling, spring, fall · **To what, where:** contents, table, feet

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This is a sentence of «The Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Twelve Dancing Princesses. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Michael), 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:pg540:2:190
# text = Michael flung the contents of the cup behind him, sprang over the table, and fell at Lina’s feet.
1	Michael	Michael	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	2	nsubj	_	_
2	flung	fling	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	contents	contents	NOUN	NNS	Number=Ptan	2	obj	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	cup	cup	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nmod	_	_
8	behind	behind	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
11	sprang	spring	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
12	over	over	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	table	table	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
18	at	at	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
19	Lina	Lina	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	21	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	’s	's	PART	POS	_	19	case	_	_
21	feet	foot	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **fling** | past | Michael | the contents of the cup behind boy |  |  |  |  | vn throw-17.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent contents=Theme |
| 2 | **spring** | past | Michael *not said here* |  |  | the table |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme over table=Trajectory |
| 3 | **fall** | past | Michael *not said here* |  |  | Lina's feet |  |  | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme at foot=Location |

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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 Red Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 540 (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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