---
title: So long as the play continued, a dicer was bound to remain within th… — The grateful elephant · tree and pragmatics
description: So long as the play continued, a dicer was bound to remain within the circle. Who acts: play, dicer. A sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 17, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The grateful elephant, Opening, part 17, sentence 109

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So long as the play continued, a dicer was bound to remain within the circle.

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**Who acts:** play, dicer · **What happens:** continue, be, remain

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This is a sentence of «The grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Opening, part 17. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (play, dicer), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg74064:17:110
# text = So long as the play continued, a dicer was bound to remain within the circle.
1	So	so	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
2	long	long	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	6	advmod	_	_
3	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	6	mark	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	play	play	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
6	continued	continue	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	dicer	dicer	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
10	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
11	bound	bound	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	conj	_	_
12	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
13	remain	remain	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	xcomp	_	_
14	within	within	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	circle	circle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **continue** | past | the play |  |  |  |  | long *property* | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **is** | past | a dicer |  |  |  |  | bound *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **remain** | to-infinitive | a dicer *not said here* |  |  |  |  | within the circle | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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 grateful elephant» by Eugene Watson Burlingame, Project Gutenberg book 74064 (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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