A. James Joyce is Max's SUPPOSEDLY Irish ancestor.
B. James Joyce is Max's SUPPOSED Irish ancestor.

Can we say which one of above is correct without knowing the intent of Author ?

MGMAT says second statement is correct because James Joyce may or may not be Max's ancestor, but James Joyce was certainly Irish. Thus,we want the adjective supposed, so that we can modify the noun ancestor.


My questions is how do we know the author's intent ? For all that matter James Joyce could be certainly Max's ancestor but he may or may not be Irish.
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~soaringAlone
~Live fast, die young and leave a marketable corpse behind !!

You're correct in theory. However, the example you're citing is just that--an example used to illustrate a principle. On the real test, we wouldn't be faced with that particular choice. We have to divine the author's intent from the context of the sentence in its five variations, and there should always be enough context to make the right decision. We choose the version that most clearly expresses what the author seems to be trying to say without making any grammatical errors. Don't worry--you won't have to know anything about the subject of the sentence to get it right!
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Dmitry Farber | Manhattan GMAT Instructor | New York


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