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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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pk6969 wrote:
HI GMATNinja . I had one doubt. I rejected the option C because it didn't have "those of" and I though it didnt make logical sense. "whose ranks included those xyz" would make more sense because xyz are people and it doesnt make sense. Please help.

Anytime you see a pronoun, it's useful to substitute whatever that pronoun is referring to in its place. If the noun makes sense, the pronoun works. If it doesn't, the pronoun is no good.

So let's try that exercise if we were to add "those of." The new sentence would read as follows:

Quote:
Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included those of Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.

What is "those of" referring to here? The closest plural noun is "ranks," but it wouldn't make any sense to write "whose ranks included the ranks of Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro."

So then maybe you'd try "actors." But "whose ranks included the actors of Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro," makes it sound like Brando and De Niro have their own actors -- is that kind of like having your own pets? -- and it's these other actors who are included in the ranks. That also doesn't work -- it's Brando and De Niro themselves who are included in the ranks.

You can keep going with the exercise, but ultimately you'll see there isn't anything in the sentence that "those of" could be standing in for. And that's a good indication that not only is the phrase unnecessary, it's illogical.

I hope that clears things up!
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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SagarV wrote:
Hello egmat

Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included

How in this sentence comma + verb-ing (training...) is modifying the action of the previous clause....What action is happening ? I fail to see...

Please help me understand. Thank you.



Hello SagarV,

Sorry for the late revert. Nonetheless, here it goes. :-)


In the correct answer choice, the comma = verb-ing modifier "training..." presents the logical explanation of the preceding clause. The main sentence says that Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater. To substantiate this point, the author further mentions that she trained many generations of actors. Actors such as Marlon Brando and Rober De Niro have been trained by her.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
GMATNinja

I don't understand what the problem is that you are referring to when you say: "there's something else at the beginning of the sentence: "as an actress... Stella Adler... trained several generations of actors." No, she only "trained generations of actors" as a "teacher of acting" -- not "as an actress." Subtle and nasty. But (B) is out." and when you say "That opening modifier makes sense now: "as an actress and... as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists..." Cool, that's great."

What is wrong with the modifier? They are the exact same in both sentences. And if choice B had said "whose ranks included", would that not be as equally correct as choice C?
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
I got it wrong, but explanation by GMATNinja helped me understand it well. I am writing here what I could absorb

kimmyg wrote:
As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.


Structure: [Modifier], and [Modifier] <underlined portion> [Example] and [Example]
The use of "and" after the first modifier restricts the placement of a third modifier in parallel. We have no option, but to mention the subject after the second modifier.

Quote:
(A) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including

Stella Adler, the subject, follows the two modifiers in parallel. Correct.
who modifies American theater, which is incorrect
including must follow the generations of actors. However, the sentence gives examples of the people. Incorrect

(A) is incorrect

Quote:
(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include

Stella Adler, the subject, follows the two modifiers in parallel. Correct.
trained modifies Stella Adler. Correct
include must follow examples of generations. However, portion not underlined gives examples of people. Incorrect

(B) is incorrect

Quote:
(C) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included

Stella Adler, the subject, follows the two modifiers in parallel. Correct.
training modifies the whole clause Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater. While this is different from (A) or (B), this still makes sense, as training other actors is something that contributes to Stella Adler being an influential artist

generations of actors whose ranks included follows the examples of "ranks". Correct

We can keep (C) for now.

Quote:
(D) one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler, who trained several generations of actors including

Third modifier in parallel, even when "and" separates the first two. This goes against what we discussed in the beginning, and thus, is incorrect.
Again, like (A) and (B), examples of people are mentioned, while examples of generations were expected. Incorrect.

Quote:
(E) one of the most influential artists in the American theater, Stella Adler, trained several generations of actors whose ranks included

Mistake of third modifier in parallel. Same as (D). Incorrect
generations of actors whose ranks included follows the examples of "ranks". Correct

Therefore, (C) is the best option
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
kimmyg wrote:
As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.


(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include





GMATNinja

Hi Charles, I personally decided to cross out answer choice B because I felt like the subject is awkwardly sandwiched between two modifiers "as an actress..." and "one of the most influential..". I also felt like the main verb "trained" was too far from the subject. Is this a valid reason to eliminate this or are the concerns I've mentioned nonissues?
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
TommyWallach
In (E), why can't "As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting" modify Stella Adler? We can have multiple modifiers in series. I am sure that (C) is the better option, but please tell me whether (E) is a less preferred option or out rightly incorrect?

TommyWallach wrote:
Hey All,

While you all got to the write answer here, there are a lot of mistakes made in the explanations that I'd like to correct.

49. As an Actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert Deniro.

The category of this question is MODIFIERS, which are responsible for almost every error. We can recognize this simply by reading the original sentence. First, it starts with a prepositional modifier (as an actress...), and then we'd notice the "who trained", which is a modifier opened with a relative pronoun. The most important rule to remember for modifiers is that noun modifiers need to touch the thing they're modifying.

a.Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including
PROBLEM: The first modifier is correct ("As an actress..." is touching "Stella Adler"). Unfortunately, the second modifier is incorrect. "Who trained several..." should be touching Stella Adler as well. Instead it's modifying "American theater", which doesn't make any sense.

b. Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include
PROBLEM: The problem here is two-fold. First of all, our modifier gets odd here. If you take out the middle man "one of the most...", we end up with a sentence saying that "As an actress and a teacher of acting, Stella Adler trained several generations of actors." That doesn't make any sense. She only taught people as a teacher, not as an actress. Also, the "who include" is modifying incorrectly here.

Think about this sample sentence, "I have a lot of friends who include Dave and Jim." It sounds like my friends are including Dave and Jim (when they hang out together), rather than that Dave and Jim are two of my many friends.

c. Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors, whose ranks included
ANSWER: This fixes both problems I discussed in B.


d. One of the most influential artist in the American theater was Stella Adler, who trained several generations of actors including
PROBLEM: First, the opening modifier "As an actress" needs to be modifying Stella Adler, but now it's modifying "one of the most influential artists...". The "including" is also problematic, like "include" in b.


e. One of the most influential artist in the American theater, Stella Adler, trained several generations of actors whose ranks included
PROBLEM: Same as above in terms of modifier. Also makes the "trained" mistake that B made. The loss of the comma creates a lack of clarity, but NOT a run-on sentence (that's when you have independent clauses without a period or semicolon to separate them).

Hope that helps!

-tommy
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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adityaganjoo wrote:
TommyWallach
In (E), why can't "As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting" modify Stella Adler? We can have multiple modifiers in series. I am sure that (C) is the better option, but please tell me whether (E) is a less preferred option or out rightly incorrect?



Hello adityaganjoo,

Here is my response to your question. :-)


Choice E is straight-away incorrect. The reason is that the sentence starts with two modifiers "as an actress" and "as a teacher of acting". These modifiers talk about a personality who was an actress and teacher of acting. Therefore, it is mandatory that that personality = Stella Adler be the subject of the sentence.

But that is not the case in Choice E. The subject in this choice is another description of the same personality - "one of the most influential artists in the American theater". "Stella Adler" simply appears as a modifier for this subject. This structure of the sentence is not grammatical.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
egmat Hi Shraddha.
I just read your post and ran through the option again. Clearly, Stella Adler is not the subject in (E). Not because Stella Adler is not third in the list, but because trained several generations precedes one of the most influential artists in the American theater, rather than Stella Adler (Writing this more for myself. I know e-gmat does not recommend removing modifiers :P )

Thanks! This is second time in 12 hours!

egmat wrote:
adityaganjoo wrote:
TommyWallach
In (E), why can't "As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting" modify Stella Adler? We can have multiple modifiers in series. I am sure that (C) is the better option, but please tell me whether (E) is a less preferred option or out rightly incorrect?



Hello adityaganjoo,

Here is my response to your question. :-)


Choice E is straight-away incorrect. The reason is that the sentence starts with two modifiers "as an actress" and "as a teacher of acting". These modifiers talk about a personality who was an actress and teacher of acting. Therefore, it is mandatory that that personality = Stella Adler be the subject of the sentence.

But that is not the case in Choice E. The subject in this choice is another description of the same personality - "one of the most influential artists in the American theater". "Stella Adler" simply appears as a modifier for this subject. This structure of the sentence is not grammatical.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
This one was tough nut to crack i had figure out the right sense there was a lot of commets so let me make a tad shorter cut to the chase i chose C for the simple Stella was the person who taught the actors not as actress this noun modifier has to be kept in muscle and the option that clear the above hurdles and presents a clear picture is imo C
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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samsung1234 wrote:
kimmyg wrote:
As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.


(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include





GMATNinja

Hi Charles, I personally decided to cross out answer choice B because I felt like the subject is awkwardly sandwiched between two modifiers "as an actress..." and "one of the most influential..". I also felt like the main verb "trained" was too far from the subject. Is this a valid reason to eliminate this or are the concerns I've mentioned nonissues?

I agree that the modifier placement in (B) is less than ideal, but awkward modifier placement is not itself an error.

As Tommy Wallach noted in an earlier post, it's better to see that "as an actress" serves as an adverbial modifier -- it's going to describe an action. But the action, in this case, is "trained several generations of actors," creating the impression that part of her job as an actress was to train other actors. That doesn't make much sense.

It seems more like likely that she trained several generations as a teacher. Note than in (C), the main verb phrase is "was one of the most influential artists." It makes a lot of sense for "as an actress" to describe how she was an influential artist; it makes less sense for "as an actress" to describe how she trained other actors.

Put another way, not only does (B) have a less than ideal modifier placement, it has a less logical meaning, and the latter is a better reason for eliminating an answer choice. That said, if I didn't see the meaning issue, would I feel comfortable using the modifier placement as a tie-breaker? Probably. Just know that you'd prefer to find a concrete error if you can.

I hope that helps!
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As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
GMATNinja wrote:
Quote:
(A) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including

The first issue is that the phrase beginning with "who" is right next to "the American theater", and that doesn't really make sense. "The American theater" isn't a person, and it didn't train generations of actors. Sure, you could maybe argue that "who trained several generations of actors..." reaches back to modify the entire phrase "one of the most influential artists in the American theater", but that's far messier than just modifying "Stella Adler", who is actually the one who trained the actors. We can argue about whether this is definitively WRONG, but at the very least, we can do better than this.

The second issue is that "including" seems to modify "several generations of actors", and that doesn't really make sense: Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro are examples of actors, not "generations of actors." It's subtle -- and probably not the worst error we've ever seen on a GMAT SC question -- but it makes (A) worse than at least one of the alternatives below.

So we can get rid of (A).

Quote:
(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include

There's still a minor problem with the very last part of the underlined portion: "several generations of actors who include Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro" sounds OK, because those two fellows are examples of actors, but then why are we saying "generations of actors"? Brando and De Niro are examples of actors, not "generations of actors." And there's another problem: "include" is present tense, and it's hard to justify the use of present tense here when the other action related to the actors occurred in the past tense ("trained").

And if you aren't completely sold by that last paragraph, there's something else at the beginning of the sentence: "as an actress... Stella Adler... trained several generations of actors." No, she only "trained generations of actors" as a "teacher of acting" -- not "as an actress." Subtle and nasty. But (B) is out.

Quote:
(C) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included

That opening modifier makes sense now: "as an actress and... as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists..." Cool, that's great. The modifier "training several generations of actors..." also makes sense: it modifies the previous clause, telling us more about Stella Adler and her life as "one of the most influential artists in the American theater.

Superficially, that last part of the underlined portion looks wordy: "several generations of actors whose ranks included..." But adding the phrase "whose ranks included" actually makes the phrase clearer than in (A) or (B): Brando and De Niro were among the ranks of those generations of actors. Fair enough.

So we can keep (C).

Quote:
(D) one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler, who trained several generations of actors including

The underlined portion is preceded by "as an actress and... as a teacher of acting", a phrase that really needs to modify "Stella Adler." It's ridiculously indirect for that phrase to modify "one of the most influential artists in the American theater." So (D) is much less clear than (C) in that part of the sentence.

Plus, we have the same minor issue with the phrase "generations of actors including..." as we did in (A). See above for more on that issue.

So (D) is gone.

Quote:
(E) one of the most influential artists in the American theater, Stella Adler, trained several generations of actors whose ranks included

(E) has the same problem as (D): the beginning of the sentence needs to modify "Stella Adler." More broadly, "Stella Adler" really needs to be the subject of the sentence, since she's the one that trained the generations of actors -- and it's an indirect mess to use "one of the most influential artists..." as the subject of the sentence.

So (E) is out, and (C) is the best option.



Good Morning !

IMO, subtle deviation from your explanation for A- although the theme is same :), who is not trying to modify theatre(going by meaning - this does not make sense), rather - the two nouns/subjects/ precedents/ challengers are Stella & the most influential artists.
who and which kinda pronouns can jump over the nearest/ touching noun and go for most eligible nouns.

So, for this reason of ambiguous referent, we can let A go off.

//rgds
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As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
GMATNinja, @ExpertGlobal5,

Hi,

I was struggling between (B) and (C). I see where (B) goes wrong, but I found 'included' in (C) to be misleading, too. The actors she trained still include Roberto De Niro and Marlon, so why do we use included?

Thanks
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
ExpertsGlobal5 wrote:
Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-
kimmyg wrote:
As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.


(A) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including

(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include

(C) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included

(D) one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler, who trained several generations of actors including

(E) one of the most influential artists in the American theater, Stella Adler, trained several generations of actors whose ranks included



Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended core meaning of this sentence is that Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater because she trained several generations of actors whose ranks included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Grammatical Construction + Awkwardness/Redundancy

A: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro“; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro were individually a generation of actors that Stella Adler trained; the intended meaning is that Stella Adler trained many generations of actors, and these generations included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.

B: This answer choice incorrectly places information that is important to the core meaning of the sentence – the fact that Stella Adler was “one of the most influential artists in the American theater“ – between two commas; please remember, information needed to maintain the core meaning of the sentence must not be placed between two commas.

C: Correct. This answer choice uses the phrases “whose ranks included”, conveying the intended meaning – that Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater because she trained several generations of actors whose ranks included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro. Further, Option C avoids the grammatical construction error seen in Options B and E, as it places no information between commas. Additionally, Option C is free of any awkwardness or redundancy.

D: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro“; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro were individually a generation of actors that Stella Adler trained; the intended meaning is that Stella Adler trained many generations of actors, and these generations included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro. Further, Option D uses the passive voice construction “one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler,”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy.

E: This answer choice incorrectly places information that is important to the core meaning of the sentence – the fact that Stella Adler was “one of the most influential artists in the American theater“ – between two commas; please remember, information needed to maintain the core meaning of the sentence must not be placed between two commas.

Hence, C is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Extra Information Between Commas" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team


ExpertsGlobal5 hello expert, i went with E cuz I was confused with the core meaning. I thought the core meaning should be ”Stella Adler trained several generations of actors”, so would you like to explain how to recognize the core meaning? Thanks in advance.
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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Mavisdu1017 wrote:
ExpertsGlobal5 wrote:
Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-
kimmyg wrote:
As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.


(A) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including

(B) Stella Adler, one of the most influential artists in the American theater, trained several generations of actors who include

(C) Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, training several generations of actors whose ranks included

(D) one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler, who trained several generations of actors including

(E) one of the most influential artists in the American theater, Stella Adler, trained several generations of actors whose ranks included



Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended core meaning of this sentence is that Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater because she trained several generations of actors whose ranks included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Grammatical Construction + Awkwardness/Redundancy

A: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro“; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro were individually a generation of actors that Stella Adler trained; the intended meaning is that Stella Adler trained many generations of actors, and these generations included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro.

B: This answer choice incorrectly places information that is important to the core meaning of the sentence – the fact that Stella Adler was “one of the most influential artists in the American theater“ – between two commas; please remember, information needed to maintain the core meaning of the sentence must not be placed between two commas.

C: Correct. This answer choice uses the phrases “whose ranks included”, conveying the intended meaning – that Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater because she trained several generations of actors whose ranks included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro. Further, Option C avoids the grammatical construction error seen in Options B and E, as it places no information between commas. Additionally, Option C is free of any awkwardness or redundancy.

D: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “several generations of actors including Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro“; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro were individually a generation of actors that Stella Adler trained; the intended meaning is that Stella Adler trained many generations of actors, and these generations included Marlon Brando and Robert De Niro. Further, Option D uses the passive voice construction “one of the most influential artists in the American theater was Stella Adler,”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy.

E: This answer choice incorrectly places information that is important to the core meaning of the sentence – the fact that Stella Adler was “one of the most influential artists in the American theater“ – between two commas; please remember, information needed to maintain the core meaning of the sentence must not be placed between two commas.

Hence, C is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Extra Information Between Commas" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team


ExpertsGlobal5 hello expert, i went with E cuz I was confused with the core meaning. I thought the core meaning should be ”Stella Adler trained several generations of actors”, so would you like to explain how to recognize the core meaning? Thanks in advance.


Hello Mavisdu1017,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, in our explanation "core meaning" refers to the basic meaning that is relevant to the solution of the question; here, we can tell that Option C is the answer choice that conveys the intended meaning, as it is the only one that conveys a logical meaning and is grammatically error-free.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
ExpertsGlobal5 hello expert, sorry I didn’t find your explanation about how to recognize ”the intended meaning”? And could you help to shed some light on E? Thanks
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
DmitryFarber wrote:
Mavisdu1017

I can't agree that the "intended meaning" can't show up in a modifier. That is definitely not true. However, we do need the sentence to convey a clear and sensible meaning, and E doesn't quite do that. The modifier move here is definitely one way to see that. The initial modifier should clearly modify the action that follows. Stella did something "As an actress and as a teacher." What did she do? She was an influential artist. She was influential in both these parts of her life. If we choose E, we're saying that "As an actress AND as a teacher," she trained actors. But both those roles don't apply to "she trained actors." She did that as a TEACHER, but not as an actress. In that sense, E doesn't convey the meaning we see in the others, or any useful meaning at all. The opening modifier must always play nicely with what follows!


DmitryFarber Much thanks for your sharing and elaboration. It’s logical and I understand now.
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
TommyWallach wrote:
Hey All,

The most important rule to remember for modifiers is that noun modifiers need to touch the thing they're modifying.

a.Stella Adler was one of the most influential artists in the American theater, who trained several generations of actors including
PROBLEM: The first modifier is correct ("As an actress..." is touching "Stella Adler"). Unfortunately, the second modifier is incorrect. "Who trained several..." should be touching Stella Adler as well. Instead it's modifying "American theater", which doesn't make any sense.



can anyone please explain why in this example placement of WHO away from the object it relates to, is NOT a mistake. it seems very similar:
"the proportion of judges and partners at major law firms who are women has not risen comparably" is correct, according to GMAT.
What's the difference?
https://gmatclub.com/forum/despite-the- ... l#p2999123
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Re: As an actress and, more importantly, as a teacher of acting, Stella [#permalink]
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