WilliamH wrote:
whichscore wrote:
The record of the past is always incomplete, and the historian who writes about it inevitably reflects the preoccupations of their own time.
(A) the historian who writes about it inevitably reflects
(B) the historian writing about it will inevitably reflect
(C) a historian writing about it inevitably reflects
(D) writing about it, it is inevitable for historians to reflect
(E) historians in writing about it inevitably reflect
I'm not an expert, but in my opinion D is less concise than E. I don't believe it is grammatically wrong. "...it is inevitable... " is an idiom, such as It is possible that... IT doesn't need to have an antecedent in this case.
WilliamH , others on the thread also believe as you do, but Option D is grammatically incorrect.
We cannot omit "the" before "writing." As such, we need to situate historians who, IN writing about the past (who, in doing something), inevitably reflect their biases.
Correct because writing is a gerund, the subject (not an option):
The record of the past is always incomplete and THE writing of such a record is difficult."The writing" is a gerund, the subject.
Not correct:
The record of the past is always incomplete and THE writing about it, it is inevitable for historians to reflect the preoccupations of their own time.That sentence is a run-on.
The sentence has clauses that are connected without logic or a conjunction.
Clause 1: The record of the past is always incomplete
Clause 2: THE writing about it . . . VERB? The writing about [the record of the past] . . . does what? is what?
Clause 3: It is inevitable for historians to reflect the preoccupations of their time.
Clauses 1 and 3 are full independent clauses that are not connected properly and worse, are interrupted by a gerund (a verbING) that as constructed must be the subject of a different verb.
The following construction
might be okay absent any other alternative: (replication of "it" may not be fatal, though I cannot see GMAT allowing such a construction):
The record of the past is always incomplete and IN the writing of it, it is inevitable for historians to reflect the preoccupations of their own time.Regardless, option E is correct and far superior to D.
Hope that helps.
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