I went for D. D means Medea appears in medieval manuscripts accompanied by ancient commentary...which has been written a bit differently in the stem as "this group includes some of Euripides’ best-known works, including the Medea." Any other thoughts?

E

Using the chart , I can conclude all except E are not TRUE.

B for me...the others present extreme cases...

What is the OA for this
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i think its B...not really sure why either..

First, there's nothing to suggest that the 'alphabeticals' do not also include some of Euripedes' best-known works. For all we know from the question, Electra might be the best known of Euripedes' plays. The 'select plays' only include "some of Euripides’ best-known works". A and B are out.

We only know that the 'select plays' have commentaries in manuscript L, so D is out.

C is a much stronger version of E. If C were true, E would be true as well, and the question cannot have two different answers which are both correct. By elimination, E ought to be correct.

Still, there's a logical flaw with this answer. The question tells us that the 'select plays' "are accompanied in L by ancient commentaries and also appear in other medieval manuscripts". The intended implication is that the alphabeticals, including Electra, neither have commentary in L, nor appear in other manuscripts- and thus do not appear with commentary in any manuscript. Logically, that's problematic. The 'select plays' are defined by two conditions: they appear in other manuscripts and have commentary in L. The 'alphabeticals' logically cannot satisfy both of these conditions; otherwise we'd call them 'select plays'. This does not mean that the alphabeticals do not satisfy one or the other of the two conditions. We know they do not have commentary in L, but that does not prevent them from appearing in other manuscripts, and perhaps having commentary in other manuscripts.

Either the question-designer messed this one up, or there was something in the original wording to better convey the intended meaning of the question. I would want to see the original wording here; "The other eight, which appear in alphabetical order, without commentary." is not a sentence.
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I feel it should be E

Here's why....

A medieval manuscript called L contains all eighteen extant tragedies
by the Greek playwright Euripides. Of these, ten called the “select
plays,” are accompanied in L by ancient commentaries and also
appear in other medieval manuscripts; this group includes some of
Euripides’ best-known works, including the Medea. The other eight,
which appear in alphabetical order, without commentary. The Electra is
one of the alphabeticals.

Which of the following can be reliably concluded on the basis of the
Statements given?

A. Only Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient
commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts.
Too extreme
B. The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries
because they were the best known of Euripides’ works.
The people who wrote the commentaries at that point in time could or could not have possibly known which were the best known of Euripides’ works. Its not safe to conclude that they did.....
C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in
ancient times.
Too extreme
D. Euripides’ Medea never appears in medieval manuscripts
unaccompanied by ancient commentary.
The plural medieval manuscripts is what makes this option wrong. Okay we have L where it is always accompanied by ancient commentary. What about Y and Z, do we know anything about them??....hmmm no
E. Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary
in any extant medieval manuscript.
This is correct as it refers to particular manuscript in question and will always be true with respect to this manuscript (ie L)

I'm not sure why you quoted me above your remarks. I never suggested the answer should be C.
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It should be E.. Was this really brutal?

Perhaps this will help, one thing that has not been address in this forum is the meaning of the word "extent", in context of this passage extent means 'still existing', or 'not destroyed yet'. By saying 'all eighteen extent tragedies' we can conclude that Euripides produced only 18 tragedies that we know of, in fact I know this to be true anyway, Euripides only produced 18 tragedies no more no less, period. So choices that were eleminated as being too extreme, ie. using the words 'only' 'no' 'does not' 'never'...should not be hastily dismissed in light of the fact that we are dealing with his entire portfolio of tragedies.

Still, I find this question a little difficlut to hone in on the correct answer choice, I initially said B, because it mentions they were the 'best known', which makes sense because they have ancient commentries, 'ancient' implies 'way before', so they were definately well known. However, I later ruled B as incorrect because 'Electra' is singled out by the author, Electra must have been another famous tragedy that must have been well known otherwise why would the author mention it. It is then possible that Electra appears in other manuscripts with commentries.

This issue of 'Electra' being single out by the author rules out A as an option as well...

I'll get back you guys when I have some more insights...