Spanning more than fifty years, Friedrich Muller began his career in

A – Muller began X and cumulated in Y is parallel but not logical. I think it would be better to say Muller’s career began X and cumulated Y.
B – correct.
C – To say his career began with the unpromising appreticeship implies that this was an event, rather than an activity.
D – begun is the wrong verb form. Should be began.
E – ...has begun... is the wrong tense. His career ‘cumulated’ and therefore this event happened in the past and after his career began. Eliminate

here is my OE

when I attack the problem thi first thing is to try to understand what going on, the meaning of the sentence, what the sentence are trying to comunicate to me. for me is the best way to tackle SC because is true that if you rely on meaning even if you do not understand completely the grammar in use CAN spot the right answer. Vice versa is NOT true.

here we can say to ourself: " what spanning ?? Muller or career ?? of course career. based on this we can analyze the question

1) is wrong based on the meaning that creee began NOT Muller

2) Seems good and also have the right idiom "apprenticeship as " hold

3) with instead of IN (notice in in the answer B) doensn't make sense at all and apprenticeship of being is wrong and ackward

4) had began indicate that start in a previous time frame but here we need the simple past AND apprenticeship of being

5) the career of Muller has begun with in sequence : wordy, wrong verb and wrong with...........

B is the answer

I hope is useful this explanation

Concept tested: Modifiers, Meaning, Verb Tenses
Difficulty: 650
Illustration: Participial phrases, acting as opening modifiers, must be followed by the noun they modify. This mistake is committed in A and D.
In C, “being” is used as an awkward modifier which is never correct in the GMAT (however other uses of “being” is permissible).
E makes an error of verb tenses which is illustrated in the tip below.
B is the correct answer.

Tip. When perfect tenses are used, it is better to visualize a tense timeline. We know that the past perfect must have happened sometime before the simple past (which must be present in the sentence) and present perfect must have started before the simple present.
In E, the timeline suggests:
Mullers career is still going on (present perfect always signifies an action which started in the past but continues in the present with respect to a present tense in the same sentence), but rather than a simple present tense, the sentence uses a simple past tense “culminated” which breaks the timeline.
Hence E is incorrect.

in B , the oa,

I do not understand

apprenticeship as a scholar

"apprenticeship" is a job. why it can be "as " a person

pls explain

Dear thangvietnam,

"Apprenticeship" means the training period for any career --- many times, it is used literally for various artisan crafts (e.g. carpentry, metalwork, bricklayer, etc.) ---- jobs that had official apprentice systems. It can be used, somewhat metaphorically, for the beginning of any type of professional career.

The idiom "apprenticeship as a Sanskrit scholar" is correct. The term "Sanskrit scholar" doesn't merely describe a human being --- it describes human being with a particular job, a particular professional role. The correct idiom is "apprenticeship as a [job role]" ----
apprenticeship as a plumber
apprenticeship as a race car driver
apprenticeship as a human rights lawyer

Does this make sense?
Mike

Thank you Magoosh expert.

apprenticeship as a driver
apprentice to a driver

are correct

we do not have
apprentice as a driver

is that right.

Dear thangvietnam,
It's true that both "apprenticeship as" and "apprenticeship to" are correct, with slightly different connotations. Using either with the noun "driver" sound very peculiar. Once a person learns to drive on his/her own, there's not much else to learn in order to be a professional driver. One may have to study and take an additional DMV test, but there isn't really any such thing as being an apprentice in some kind of professional driver.

Apprentices are most typical in artisan & craft professions --- a wood-worker, a cabinet maker, an iron-worker, stone mason, an inscription carver, a carpenter, a roofer, a shoe repairman, a tailor, etc. ---- high-skill blue collar jobs. They are not typical in either highly professional white collar jobs (doctor, lawyer, professor, etc.) nor in purely manual jobs (ditch digger, street cleaner, etc.) Even being a professional driver, while requiring moderately more skill than a ditch digger, is not really a "high skill" blue collar job.

If I say "I work as an apprentice as a cabinet maker" --- this has the connotation that, yes, I can call myself a cabinet-maker, but I am very new to the job and still working under the instruction & guidance of someone more experienced. This idiom would be more appropriate for an apprentice toward the end of his apprenticeship, about to "graduate" and become a full artisan on his own.

If I say "I work as an apprentice to a cabinet maker" --- this has the connotation that, I am really just a beginning and have no right even to call myself a "cabinet maker" at this time. I work as an aide to a genuine cabinet maker, and presumably it is my intention to learn the trade so that, one fine day in the future, I would be able to call myself a "cabinet maker." This idiom would be more appropriate for an apprentice toward the beginning of his apprenticeship, still a rank beginner and basically just a glorified servant to the master craftsman.

Does this distinction make sense?
Mike

Could you explain what is exactly the issue with (C):

"Muller’s career began with the unpromising apprenticeship of being "

is " began with" is the issue as well ?

can't we say "apprenticeship of" ?

Thanks

Dear Practicegmat

The idiom "to begin with" is 100% correct, perfectly fine. The problem with (C) is ----- there is no idiom "apprenticeship of", and in particular, the phrasing "apprenticeship of being X" is totally wrong, an incorrect way to say "apprenticeship as X."

Does this make sense?

Mike

Hi,
Btween B & C I actually got confused by the phrase "began in"(in B) & began with (in C). Isnt "began with" correct idiomatically. "began in" doesnt sound right.

Dear Nibalh_s,
Here's a free idiom ebook you may find helpful:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idiom-ebook/
Mike

In response to someone who asked why we don't say "began in an apprenticeship to be a scholar"---let's examine the following:

Core = "his career BEGAN in X as Y and culminated in Z"

BEGAN in (an apprenticeship) AS a scholar.

So usage of "AS" is correct.

We do not use "TO" as in "began in an apprenticeship to be a scholar" because that would CHANGE the MEANING.

"TO" usage = "in order to" --> This implies that he began an apprenticeship in order to become a scholar.

But no, that's not the meaning here. He began the apprenticeship AS a scholar--not in order to become a scholar.

Yes, the general structure is:

Right off the bat i see that A is wrong because "spanning" should not refer to the person muller, but his career, so after 5 seconds A is gone.

B) This sounds right, Im a bit iffy about "career began" and "apprenticeship as" but I definitely keep this as a contender.

C) "with the" sounds weird, "of being" sounds weird, so between B and C, B sounds best but I still keep C as a contender.

D) Again, this makes spanning refer to the person Muller so this is gone in 2 seconds

E) "has" is erroneously in present tense, we notice this if we check to the right of the underlined portion where we find "culminated", which is past tense. E is gone.

Back to B and C. C makes it seem as if a apprenticeship as a Sanskrit scholar by default is unpromising, and if you have a grasp of the intended MEANING of the sentence, you know this is not what the author is trying to say. The author wants to tell us that "his career started off shaky but got a lot better". C is gone and we are left with B.

Notice that I did not eliminate C based on grammatical errors; C does not have any immediate grammatical faults. But you NEED to have a firm understanding of the intended MEANING of the author, and you absolutely have to understand what every option is telling you. This way, you can confidently dismiss C and thus you go with the correct answer: B

However, I selected the right choice, but I did not found the solid reason to reject choice E other than the usage of first name(Friedrich) of Muller. If first name were not there, this choice would be incorrect because present perfect tense is not correct here; however, I don't know why. Please explain !

Spanning more than fifty years, Friedrich Muller began his career in an unpromising apprenticeship as a Sanskrit scholar and culminated in virtually every honor that European governments and learned societies could bestow.
(E) the career of Muller has begun with an unpromising apprenticeship of

I could think of two reasons why present perfect tense is not correct here.
1. We are talking about two events.
event1: F's career BEGAN as a sanskrit scholar.
event2. It culminated in every honor.
As you can mark, the event 1 has occurred first, so use of present perfect is not correct here. Use of past perfect tense could be allowed.

2. The given sentence is in simple past tense. Unless its meaning is not clear, we should stick to the original sentence. Use of simple past tense does not create any ambiguity here.

Hope this clears your doubt.

Hi Ruchi,

Second point is understood, but this does not give me the solid ground to reject a choice. On the first point, you interpreted event2 : It culminated in every honor
however, I interpreted event2 : It has culminated in every honor.(has was not repeated after and)

so, I considered both events in present perfect

Present perfect is used to depict an event that has begun at a point in past and continues till the present moment.

The movie has begun.
The above sentence implies: the movie still continues - if the movie has already ended, then the present perfect tense "has begun" is wrong - it should be simple past "began".

For the same reason the present perfect in option E is wrong.

Moreover, "apprenticeship of scholar" is wrong.