A medieval manuscript called L contains all eighteen extant tragedies

Question

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.

B. The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries
because they were the best known of Euripides’ works.

C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in
ancient times.

D. Euripides’ Medea never appears in medieval manuscripts
unaccompanied by ancient commentary.

E. Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary
in any extant medieval manuscript.

kinjiGC · Accepted Answer

L - Medieval manuscript - L contains 18 extant tragedies.
10 -> have ancient commentaries in L and they appear in other medieval manuscripts -> one of them is Medea.
Other 8 -> Doesn't contain any ancient commentary in L and also doesn't appear in other medieval manuscripts.-> One of them is Electra.

A. Only Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts -  Cannot be inferred as best known work can be in other 8. 
B. The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries because they were the best known of Euripides’ works -  Cannot be inferred as nothing is said why they are called "select plays"  
C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in ancient times -  Cannot be inferred as Electra is not found in other medieval manuscripts. There might be commentaries written else where and not found yet. No is a strong word here. 
D. Euripides’ Medea never appears in medieval manuscripts unaccompanied by ancient commentary -  Medea has ancient commentary in L. The passage doesn't say about other medieval manuscripts 
E. Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. -  Can be inferred as Electra is not even mentioned in other ancient manuscripts.

IanStewart · Answer

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.

Ashwin_Mohan · Answer

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)

eybrj2 · Answer

So weird question... I don't agree with any of those answer choices.

a. We don't know and "only" is too extreme.

b. Some of the select plays are Euripides's best known work, so we cannot assume or say with the passage that the whole select plays are the best known work

c. Commentaries might have been written about Electra in ancient times since we cannot assume with the passage that Electra only appears in the medival manuscript called L and that also the L is the only extant medival manuscript.

d. We don't know "never" is too exterme.

e. We don't know anything about other extant medival manuscript.

"Now there is one little step.  Notice how the "select plays" differ from "the alphabeticals" in that they are ALSO found in other medieval manuscripts.  Therefore the "other eight" are not found in medieval manuscripts ------> Electra does not appear in other ancient manuscripts. The only manuscript it does appear in it is not accompanied by commentary. Thus (E)."

This is explanation of a GMAT instructor from another GMAT website.
I can't see how the bold part makes sense. The passage mentions that the select plays have commentary whereas other other eight don't, but the passage doesn't mention anything that implies the select plays are different from the other eight in that they also found in other medieval manuscripts.

I'd like to hear other people's opinions on this issue.

GMATPill · Answer

The statement *does* reference that those "select" plays also appear in other medieval manuscripts.

"Of these, ten called the “select plays,” are accompanied in L by ancient commentaries and also appear in other medieval manuscripts;"

So what it's saying here is that these 10 were so popular they were also captured in other manuscripts out there, not just this "L" one. This "L" happens to also include 8 additional "less known" plays. The "Electra" is a lesser known play and doesn't have commentary as is described since it is among the "8".

We know that the 10 were "also in other manuscripts" => kind of implying that the remaining 8 were not. The 8 did not have commentary and were not as known. Most likely they were not in other manuscripts. So (E) says that Electra does not appear with a commentary in ANY manuscript. Well the only one that it *appears* to be in does NOT have a commentary - so (E) seems to be a valid conclusion. Note (E) mentions the word "appear" so we don't know for sure but it's highly likely based on what we inferred - that it doesn't have commentary in ANY manuscript.

ConnectTheDots · Answer

OA is E.
Source: GMAT Prep EP

C is wrong cause it strongly says no commentaries were written at all. However, we are taking about only the extant manuscripts. It is possible that the commentaries were written, but somehow the manuscripts are lost or not found.

ramalcha · Answer

This is a real brain twister. Can an expert please look into this? I answered C, my reasoning was that Electra was an alphabetical, and alphabeticals are written without commentary, thus no commentaries were written. I need help understanding this better.

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

(C) is a trap answer, one such that we can fool ourselves into thinking that the passage supports it even though the passage does not really support it.

Here's what the passage says about  Electra .

The other eight, which appear only in  L , are called "alphabeticals", because they appear in alphabetical order, without commentary.  The Electra  is one of the alphabetical.

The passage does indicate the following:

-  Electra  appears only in  L .

- No commentary appears in  L  with  Electra .

So, we can get the impression that since  Electra  appears only in  L  and without commentary, no commentaries were written about  Electra  in ancient times.

But wait a minute. Couldn't commentaries about  Electra  have been written elsewhere, even if  Electra  itself did not appear elsewhere? Of course. Commentaries about  Electra  could have appeared in other manuscripts.

Here's (C).

C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in ancient times.

Since the passage tells us only that no commentaries about  Electra  appear in  L  but does not say that no commentaries about  Electra  appeared anywhere else, the passage does not support what (C) says.

energetics · Answer

Tough question, got this one wrong due to carelessness. There's a lot of things going on here and I usually don't write anything down on verbal, although for this one I probably should have to keep the relationships straight.

What we know: 
--- L has 10 well-known plays with comments, including Medea 
--- L has 8 without comments. The 8 without  only  appear in L (Electra is one of them)
--- the 10 well-known plays also appear in other manuscripts

A.   Only  Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts. 
We don't know whether any other manuscripts besides L have commentary to being with. "Only" is an extreme word.

B.  The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries because they were the best known of Euripides’ works. 
We don't know if popularity was the driving force for the commentary. Maybe they just have the most relevant subject matter to the people commenting or something.

C.   No  commentaries were written about Euripides’  Electra  in ancient times. 
We don't know anything about commentaries other than that L has some. It's entirely plausible that some were written but are now lost. "No" is an extreme word.

D.  Euripides’s  Medea   never  appears in medieval manuscripts unaccompanied by ancient commentary. 
As in C, we don't know anything about commentaries other than that L has some. "Never" is an extreme word.

E.  Euripides’  Electra  does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. 
We know this because Electra ONLY appears in L, and is one of the 8 that does not have commentary.

AA01 · Answer

GMATNinja   egmat   VeritasKarishma  - Can you help me eliminate option C?

KarishmaB · Answer

Take a simpler example:

(C) There are no kangaroos in the world.

vs

(E) There are no kangaroos in Asia.

The passage only indicates about Asia, not about the whole world. So we can conclude only about Asia, not about the whole world.

Our original situation is similar. The argument only talks about no appearance of commentary with Electra in medieval manuscripts. Hence (E) must be true.
E. Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript.

(C) goes beyond our argument. Is it possible that there was commentary with Electra is some other writing (not medieval manuscripts)? Sure. We don't know about other writings. 
C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in ancient times.

then we cannot say that (C) must be true. 
Note that two options cannot be both correct in a question. If (C) were true, (E) would be automatically true and that is not possible. So without too much effort, you should realise that (C) cannot be the answer.

LogicGuru1 · Answer

NOW THAT THIS QUESTION HAS BEEN CORRECTED WITH ADDITIONAL INFORMATION, HERE ARE MY TWO CENTS :-

A. Only Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts. WRONG
Ten best known works appear in  L with commentary  but  they are found in other medieval manuscript too.  (Written clearly in Question Stem.)
There is a probability that those other medieval manuscripts may not have a commentary. 
There is no way to ascertain that other medieval manuscripts have commentaries or not.

B. The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries because they were the best known of Euripides’ works. WRONG
All we know that these select plays are his best work and have commentaries. 
The question stem gives no indication for the reason of commentary being attached to only these plays. 
May be the commentary are attached because they are his best work or may be the commentary is attached because they were part of a discourse where other scholars tried to critique it and thus have added commentary. May be the commentary is added by an ancient Ph.D student as a part of his desertation. WHO KNOWS !!

C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’  Electra  in ancient times. MAY BE RIGHT .. KEEP IT 
ELECTRA is found only in  "book L"  and no where else. 
It is a part of  alphabetical play series   which do not have commentary.
Merging these two we can safely assume that since Electra is only found in L and have no commentary therefore no commentary was ever written on it. HOLD THIS OPTION

D. Euripides’s  Medea  never appears in medieval manuscripts unaccompanied by ancient commentary. WRONG
Madea is found in Book L, but Madea is also found in many other medieval tests. (Given clearly in the Question stem)
In Book L, Madea has commentary. But in other medieval books Madea may or may not have commentary.

E. Euripides’  Electra  does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. CORRECT ANSWER BETTER THAN OPTION C
Electra is a part of alphabetical play series in Book L. Alphabetical plays have no commentary. Therefore Electra has no commentary when it appears in Book L. 
The alphabetical plays do not appear in any other medieval book. It means ELECTRA does not appear anywhere else.
MERGING THE TWO WE GET :- Electra never has commentary in any book (in reality it's just one book L because it is the only book where Electra appears and appears without commentary)

THIS OPTION IS MORE CONCISE AND ALIGNED WITH THE QUESTION STEM AND THEREFORE IS BETTER THAN OPTION C 
ALSO NOTE OPTION C DOES NOT TALK ABOUT  MEDIEVAL MANUSCRIPTS   BUT ANCIENT TIMES .
C.No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in  ancient times

Taking all this in account OPTION E is the best answer

Raman109 · Answer

Understanding the argument -
A medieval manuscript called L contains all eighteen extant tragedies by the Greek playwright Euripides. Fact.
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. Fact
The other eight, which appear only in L, are called "alphabeticals" because they appear in alphabetical order, without commentary. - Fact
The Electra is one of the alphabetical. - Fact

Option Elimination -

A. Only Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts. - No. There can very well be others. We can't infer this from the argument.

B. The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries because they were the best known of Euripides’ works. - The reason is not mentioned in the argument. Wrong.

C. No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in ancient times. - change of reference of period. "Ancient time" is a period before the "medieval (middle ages) period." The argument discusses the "medieval manuscript" but not the "ancient times." The author uses the word "ancient" mentioned in some other context and creates this option. This is a classic distortion.

D. Euripides’s Medea never appears in medieval manuscripts unaccompanied by ancient commentary. - We don't know. It can't be reliably inferred from the argument.

E. Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. - ok. Extant means still surviving

KarishmaB · Answer

Premises: Manuscript 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 only in L, are called "alphabeticals", because they appear in alphabetical order, without commentary. The Electra is one of the alphabetical. The argument is a bit difficult because of the arcane references. This is what the author says: Manuscript L contains ALL 18 tragedies by E. Of these 18, 10 are called select plays and have commentaries in L. They appear in other manuscripts too. Medea is one of them. Rest 8 called alphabeticals appear only in L and have no commentaries. The Electra is one of these 8. (A) Only Euripides’ best-known works are accompanied by ancient commentaries in extant medieval manuscripts.   There could be many other works of Euripides’. Manuscript L contains all eighteen extant tragedies, not all works.   (B) The select plays are accompanied by ancient commentaries because they were the best known of Euripides’ works.  We don’t know why select plays have commentaries. (C) No commentaries were written about Euripides’ Electra in ancient times.   We don’t know whether a commentary was written about Electra in ancient times. Electra appears only in L without commentary but a commentary about it could have been written separately somewhere else.   (D) Euripides’s Medea never appears in medieval manuscripts unaccompanied by ancient commentary.   Medea is found in other manuscripts too. It could be unaccompanied by commentary somewhere else.    (E) Euripides’ Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. The only medieval manuscript in which Electra appears is L. It is not accompanied by commentary in L. So, Electra does not appear accompanied by a commentary in any extant medieval manuscript. Correct. Answer (E) Discussion on Inference Questions: https://youtu.be/PMnU9ULdSfs

Ale300503 · Answer

This question is messed up. There are no correct answers here.
E) is wrong too, as the fact that there is no commentary in L does not prevent from appearing in the  commentary of other medieval manuscripts.  This logical passage cannot be inferred from the information given.

VasundharaS · Answer

Why is B not an answer?

As far as E, L contains all tragedies, Electra could appeat in other extant manuscripts with commentaries, right?

harryzhang · Answer

believe the key here is the process of elimination since all answers seem a bit sus (normal for a 705-805 level question)

(a) "only" is very extreme, article mentioned there are "other medieval manuscripts" beyond L and do not specify explicitly whether they have commentaries; also articles says this includes "some" not ALL the best well known work are in "select plays"; insufficient support to say "only"

(b) "because" -> causality; very hard to establish and not indicated in the article

(c) "no" is very strong word and extreme; we cannot be sure that there's none

(d) "never" is another very strong word; we cannot be suer that there's none

(e) still seems sus but it says "does not appear" is very safe - nothing extreme; based on the info given, we can reach this temporary conclusion as suggested

AbhishekP220108 · Answer

Since this question is formed given all the facts, as an inference questions we have to verify each option why it is wrong, the option which is correct we are not going to find reason to eliminate and thats the option E

A medieval manuscript called L contains all eighteen extant tragedies

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A medieval manuscript called L contains all eighteen extant tragedies

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