---
title: Again, if there are really no fairies, why do people believe in them… — The Yellow Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Again, if there are really no fairies, why do people believe in them, all over the world? Who acts: people. A sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Joan, Toddles, and Tiny, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/2/30/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Yellow Fairy Book](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/) / [Joan, Toddles, and Tiny](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/2/) / 30

# The Yellow Fairy Book, Joan, Toddles, and Tiny, sentence 30

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Again, if there are really no fairies, why do people believe in them, all over the world?

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** people · **What happens:** be, believe · **To what, where:** fairies, world

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Joan, Toddles, and Tiny. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg640:2:30
# text = Again, if there are really no fairies, why do people believe in them, all over the world?
1	Again	again	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
4	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	5	expl	_	_
5	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
6	really	really	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
7	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	8	det	_	_
8	fairies	fairy	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
10	why	why	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	13	advmod	_	_
11	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
12	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
13	believe	believe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	acl:relcl	_	_
14	in	in	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
17	all	all	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
18	over	over	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present |  | no fairies |  |  | again |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **believe** | present · do-support | people |  |  | the world |  | in Fairies *= fairy* | vn admire-31.2 «NP V that S»: agent=Experiencer |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The Yellow Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 640 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/2/29/)
- next →: [sentence 31](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/2/31/)
- ↑ back to [Joan, Toddles, and Tiny](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg640/2/)