tusharrgarg93 wrote:
ywilfred wrote:
Emily Dickinson’s letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumbering her letters to anyone else.
(A) Dickinson were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumbering
(B) Dickinson were written over a period that begins a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ended shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumber
(C) Dickinson, written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and that ends shortly before Emily’s death in 1886 and outnumbering
(D) Dickinson, which were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother, ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, and outnumbering
(E) Dickinson, which were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumber
Dickinson's surviving letters to Susan, which began ardently a few years before Susan's marriage and continued almost until the poet's death in 1886, outnumber her letters to anyone else. After an examination of these cryptic messages, Ellen Louise Hart and Martha Nell Smith have emerged up in arms for Susan. In compiling ''Open Me Carefully'' (which includes more than 20 poems and one letter not previously connected to Susan), they aim to show that the women enjoyed a long, close relationship, one whose workaday exchange of ''letter-poems'' (Susan's term) contributed to ''the texture of their daily life.'' Even more urgent, however, is their intent to champion Susan as Dickinson's ''primary reader'' -- the person they believe exerted the most significant, sustaining influence on Dickinson's poetic and erotic sensibility.[/spoiler]
@gmatninja- Isn't "Outnumbering" in choice A, modifying Emily's letters?
Remember, when an -ING modifier follows a full clause and a comma, the modifier is describing the entire previous clause or giving us insight into the main verb of that clause. It's not just describing the subject of the clause.
In (A), that interpretation doesn't really work. Take another look at the initial clause:
Quote:
Emily Dickinson’s letters to Susan Huntington were written over a period...
So we're getting information about
when the letters were written. But the modifier beginning with "outnumbering" is about
where most of the letters went. That doesn't make sense.
Put another way, the fact that the letters were written during a certain period in the 19th century doesn't explain
why they mostly went to Susan Huntington Dickinson, does it? Rather, those feel like two distinct pieces of information: 1) she wrote during a certain period and 2) she wrote mostly to Susan Dickinson. One doesn't explain or describe the other.
The construction in (E) makes more sense. One modifier describes the letters letters themselves. And the other is a verb phrase giving us additional, but unrelated info. Totally logical!
So while (A) isn't definitively wrong, it's a less logical construction than (E). Tricky.
I hope that helps!
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