---
title: The story of Maui seeking immortality for the human race is one of t… — Hawaiian Historical Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: The story of Maui seeking immortality for the human race is one of the finest myths in the world. Who acts: story. A sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Maui Seeking Immortality, 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/pg66357/3/1/)

<!-- 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/) / [Hawaiian Historical Legends](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/) / [Maui Seeking Immortality](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/3/) / 1

# Hawaiian Historical Legends, Maui Seeking Immortality, sentence 1

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The story of Maui seeking immortality for the human race is one of the finest myths in the world.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** story · **What happens:** seek, be · **To what, where:** immortality, one

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Maui Seeking Immortality. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (story), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66357:3:1
# text = The story of Maui seeking immortality for the human race is one of the finest myths in the world.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	story	story	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
3	of	of	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
4	Maui	Maui	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	2	nmod	_	_
5	seeking	seek	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	2	acl	_	_
6	immortality	immortality	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	_
7	for	for	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	human	human	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	race	race	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
11	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
12	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	0	root	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	finest	fine	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	16	amod	_	_
16	myths	myth	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nmod	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **seek** | gerund | the story of Maui *not said here* | immortality |  |  |  | for the human race | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent immortality=Location for race=Theme |
| 2 | **is a** | present | the story of Maui | one |  |  |  | of the finest myths in the world | tree rules |

<!-- .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:** «Hawaiian Historical Legends» by W. D. Westervelt, Project Gutenberg book 66357 (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: [Maui the Polynesian, 86](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/2/86/)
- next →: [sentence 2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/3/2/)
- ↑ back to [Maui Seeking Immortality](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66357/3/)