---
title: ‘A fish is playing with it just now,’ replied the voice; ‘however, y… — The Pink Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: ‘A fish is playing with it just now,’ replied the voice; ‘however, you shall have it without delay.’ Who acts: fish, playing, you. A sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg5615/38/107/)

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# The Pink Fairy Book, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38, sentence 107

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‘A fish is playing with it just now,’ replied the voice; ‘however, you shall have it without delay.’

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**Who acts:** fish, playing, you · **What happens:** play, reply, have · **To what, where:** voice, ring · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Pink Fairy Book, part 38. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fish, playing, you), 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:pg5615:38:107
# text = ‘A fish is playing with it just now,’ replied the voice; ‘however, you shall have it without delay.’
1	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	fish	fish	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
5	playing	play	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	12	csubj	_	_
6	with	with	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	obl	_	_
8	just	just	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	_
9	now	now	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
12	replied	reply	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	voice	voice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	21	punct	_	_
16	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	however	however	ADV	RB	_	21	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
19	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
20	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
21	have	have	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	parataxis	_	_
22	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	21	obj	_	_
23	without	without	ADP	IN	_	24	case	_	_
24	delay	delay	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	21	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	21	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **play** | present · progressive | a fish |  |  |  | now | with ring | vn play-114.2-1 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent with it=Theme |
| 2 | **reply** *speech: assert* | past | playing | the voice |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent voice=Topic |
| 3 | **have** | shall | you | ring |  |  |  | without delay; however *property* | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Patient |

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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 Pink Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 5615 (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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