It is the relationship of Hemingway with his mother, Grace, which is p

Hello Skywalker18,

A very good attempt I must say.

This question drives home the point once more that the intended logical is of utmost importance on GMAT SC, a section that requires logical approach to master.

Here is how we would solve this question at e-GMAT.

It is the relationship of Hemingway with his mother, Grace, which is probably the most enigmatic of all the women in his life.

The first and foremost thing, let’s evaluate if the sentence conveys the meaning it intends to convey.

Meaning Analysis: The author of the sentence begins by mentioning about the relationship of a person named Hemingway with his mother whose name was Grace. Then the author says that Grace was probably the most enigmatic of all the women in Hemingway’s life.
But wait a minute. Did not the author begin the sentence by talking about the relationship between the son and the mother? What about that? There is nothing mentioned about the relationship.
From the context of the sentence, we understand that the sentence is meant to talk about the relationship between Hemingway and his mother Grace. But the way the latter part of the sentence is worded, it seems to describe Grace.

Error Analysis: During the meaning analysis, we understood that the sentence talks about Grace rather than about the relationship between Hemingway and Grace. We need an answer choice that corrects this error and conveys the intended meaning. So let’s see what are the errors in the original sentence that needs to be corrected.

Meaning error: The way the which modifier is worded it seems to describe Grace. But use of which to describe a person is incorrect.

However, we don’t need an option that turns which into who because per the meaning analysis, the sentence must talk about the relationship between Hemingway and Grace. Hence, we do need the modifier which.

Please note that in this sentence, which logically and grammatically refers to a slightly far-away noun* the relationship.

So we must look for an answer choice that is worded such that describes the relationship.


Answer Choice Analysis:

Choice A: which is probably the most enigmatic of all the women in his life: Incorrect because it does not convey the intended meaning.

Choice B: who is probably the most enigmatic of all the women in his life: Incorrect. This choice is grammatically correct but this choice talks about Grace. This is not what the original sentence wants to convey.

Choice C: which is probably the most enigmatic of all his relationships with women: Correct. This answer choice presents the intended meaning in correct grammar.

Choice D: who, of all the relationships he had with women, is probably the most enigmatic: Incorrect. Use of who to describe the relationship is incorrect.

Choice E: which, of all the women in his life, is probably the most enigmatic relationship he had: Incorrect. The phrase of all the women in his life seems to be the description of the relationship. This indeed leads to illogical meaning.

You can read about how noun modifiers modify a slightly far-away noun in the following link:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/noun-modifiers-can-modify-slightly-far-away-noun-135868.html


Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha