Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his

My answer is (E). It took me 35 seconds.

I took a quick scan of options before reading the sentence: they are all different.

(E) is a clear winner because "delightful because of his words" is in perfect parallel with "annoying because of his erratic nature".

For other options, (C) can be easily eliminated thanks to "too"; (D) is problematic because "being" can be safely removed.

As for (A) and (B), I can only say they are inferior to (E) by a huge margin. We have to check OE for in-depth analysis.

Answer imo: E
POE:
A: but from FANBOYS is acting as a conjunction. Not parallel. Because of[] BUT his .
B: Although uses comma to separate Independent and dependent clauses.
C: Tone mismatch . too is used to magnify the degree. Here, a tone change is required .
D: Meaning change- Annoying when being delightful ??
E: Concise and paralle structured

Let me know if I messed up anything

Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his erratic nature but his words are still a delight.


(A) but his words are still a delight -> "annoying because of" is not parallel to "his words are still a delight". Incorrect.

(B) although he uses words delightfully -> Same as A.

(C) and he is delightful in his use of words too -> we don't need "and" because "and" doesn't serve the contrast purpose. Incorrect.

(D) while being delightful because of his words ->"annoying because of" is not parallel to "being delightful because of his words". Incorrect.

(E) but delightful because of his words -> Parallelism error corrected.

So, I think E.

Comparison is between Poet is annoying and (but) Poet is delightful.
For parallelism 'because of his erratic nature' and 'because of his words', Option E suits perfectly.

IMO E

Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his erratic nature but his words are still a delight.

Error Analysis:- I couldn't see any deterministic error in the original sentence. Intended meaning is showing the contrast about a poet he is annoying but his words are still a delight.

(A) but his words are still a delight
Correct.

(B) although he uses words delightfully
Incorrect. changes the intended meaning.

(C) and he is delightful in his use of words too
Incorrect. Missed the contrast.
(D) while being delightful because of his words
Incorrect. Usage of being is incorrect.
(E) but delightful because of his words
Incorrect. Changes the meaning.

Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his erratic nature but his words are still a delight.


(A) but his words are still a delight Incorrect

words plural, a delight singular

(B) although he uses words delightfully Incorrect

meaning change

(C) and he is delightful in his use of words too Incorrect

uses too wrong

(D) while being delightful because of his words Incorrect

being uses wrong

(E) but delightful because of his words Correct

IMOE E

[quote]Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his erratic nature but his words are still a delight.

Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is X But Y

X and Y needs to be parallel


(A) but his words are still a delight Not parallel. Talking about the poet in X (He is annoying) but his words in Y

(B) although he uses words delightfully Incorrect. The contrast is not proper.

(C) and he is delightful in his use of words too Incorrect. We need contrast. And is not correct

(D) while being delightful because of his words Incorrect

(E) but delightful because of his words Correct. Proper parallel elements X and Y


(E)

IMO E

Option E corrects Parallelism error
He is X because of A but Y because of B

Official Explanation:

Answer: E

Friends of the poet use two words to describe him—annoying and delightful. These two should be in the correct parallel form. Also, note that these two qualities are contrasting so should be joined using a contrasting connector such as but. Thus, E is the correct answer.

(A) The passive construction breaks the parallel structure.

(B) Nothing wrong with the grammar and also uses the contrasting word although. The problem is that this option distorts the meaning of the original sentence by using delightfully as an adverb to modify uses whereas the original sentence does not tell us anything about how the author uses the words.

(C) The use of and and too distorts the meaning of the sentence because the poet is being described using contrasting qualities.

(D) Unnecessarily uses the avoidable being that breaks the parallelism.

Friends of the reclusive poet say that he is annoying because of his erratic nature but his words are still a delight.

There are two qualities of a person is compared.

his personality is compared with his words
Wrong comparison
A is out

Comparison can be stated properly by using "but"
B, C, and D are out.

Correct comparison

E is a clear win.

Hi Bunuel VeritasKarishma although I selected the correct option choice, I want to make sure that I eliminated the wrong one for the correct reasons.

The reason I eliminated A is as below
"of his erratic nature" (non underlined portion) a phrase is not parallel with "his words are still a delight" a clause. Similarly with B, we cant have a phrase and clause parallel to each other.

Is my line of thinking correct here?

The reason (A) and (B) are wrong is that (E) is a clean, parallel construction.
The contrast is between "annoying because of his erratic nature" and "delightful because of his words".

In option (A),
"he is annoying because of his erratic nature" and "his words are still a delight" are independent clauses.
When a conjunction joins two independent clauses, it is often preceded by a comma. Since there is no comma here, I would expect that "but" is giving contrast between "annoying" and "delightful".
I do see an option that does just that.
Nothing wrong with (B) either but we have a better option.

Thanks, Karishma, makes much more sense now, I think I got it right by mistake, will focus more on why a wrong choice is wrong to get to the crux of it. Thanks again.

karishma in option E is after but is implied?
As but this is new independent clause which require subject and verb i eliminated E thought there is no verb in there. Please explain VeritasKarishma

Do you mean "comma after but"? The comma, if there is one, will be before "but". When a co-ordinating conjunction such as "but" joins two independent clauses, we often use a comma before "but".

I don't play any musical instrument, but my sister plays the drums.

"But" is used to show contrast. It need not connect only independent clauses. e.g.
He is poor but happy.

Hence, this is correct - He is annoying because of ... but delightful because of ...

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