---
title: “If I live, my mother, I will come back for you if I can find my fat… — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: “If I live, my mother, I will come back for you if I can find my father.” Who acts: mother. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Story of Old China, part 2, sentence 65

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“If I live, my mother, I will come back for you if I can find my father.”

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**Who acts:** mother · **What happens:** live, come back, find · **To what, where:** mother, father

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mother), 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:pg75089:18:65
# text = “If I live, my mother, I will come back for you if I can find my father.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	If	if	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
3	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	live	live	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
7	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
9	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
11	come	come	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
12	back	back	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
13	for	for	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	11	obl	_	_
15	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
16	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
17	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	find	find	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	advcl	_	_
19	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **live** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | present | the mother *= mother* | my mother |  |  |  |  | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme mother=Location |
| 2 | **come back** *in a quote* | future | the mother *= mother* |  |  |  |  | for you | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **find** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | can | the mother *= mother* | my father |  |  |  |  | vn discover-84 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent father=Topic |

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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:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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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