Giuseppe Alessi, a world-class chef whose life has been a search for

First look: Parallelism, modifiers, idioms.

A. not only unearthing many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts but also a poet and philosopher who draws Wrong - "Not only..but also" is an idiom that requires parallel elements; "unearthing" and "a poet...who" are not parallel.

B. unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws Wrong - The sentence with "as well as" requires consistency among the predicates. "Both" is also idiomatic and not used correctly.

C. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws Ok - Parallel elements "who unearths...who draws"

D. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, but also a poet and a philosopher drawing Wrong - "but also" is an idiomatic construction. Furthermore, "who" and "drawing" are not consistent.

E. unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, a poet and philosopher drawing Wrong - The answer choice makes "a poet and philosopher" in to an appositive incorrectly modifying manuscripts or recipes.

IMO C

Yes. "Not only X....but also Y" suggests that X and Y are similar elements. For example, "I not only forgot to pack lunch for my children, but I also neglected to pick them up from the zoo." In this case the two actions, "forgot to pack lunch" and "neglected to them pick up" are both negative. Unless you hate children.

However, "X... but also Y" suggests a contrast between X and Y. For example, "I forgot to to pack lunch for my children, but I also cooked them a delicious dinner that night." Now we have a negative action, "forgot to pack lunch," balanced out by a positive one, "cooked them a delicious dinner." (Was this dinner actually a delivered pizza? That's none of your business. )

We're told that Giuseppe Alessi is an "accomplished scholar." That's a good thing, suggesting a cultivated mind! We're also told that he's a "poet and philosopher." These are also good things, suggesting a cultivated mind. Because the elements are similar, the proper usage would be "not only an accomplished scholar... but also a poet and philosopher." Without the "not only" it sounds as though those are contrasting elements, which is illogical.

I hope that helps!
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This is what the sentence is trying to tell us:

GA, a world class chef, is an accomplished scholar (he unearths many of his recipes from manuscripts) and a poet and philosopher (he draws his inspiration from the idyllic frescoes of Etruscan tombs)

Option (A) puts "unearthing recipes ..." parallel to "a poet and philisopher..." using "not only but also" construct. This is incorrect. We know that he is scholar (who does something) and a poet and philosopher (does another thing)

Option (B) - the use of 'both' is redundant and confusing. "unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts"
We are trying to say that he unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts. What does 'both' mean? That the recipes he finds are available in both sources or that he uses both sources? It makes sense to say that he uses both sources to get recipes in which case 'both' is redundant.
Importantly, 'both' appearing before the preposition 'from' doesn't make sense. It doesn't apply to both sources in that case.
We need to say 'unearthing many of his recipes from both A and B (though this is still redundant)' not 'unearthing many of his recipes both from A and B'
It's best to say 'unearthing many of his recipes from A and B'

Option (C)
GA, a world-class chef ..., is an accomplished scholar who unearths..., as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws...
Correct.

Option (D) - GA, a world-class chef ..., is an accomplished scholar who unearths..., but also a poet and a philosopher drawing ...
The standalone use of 'but also' doesn't make sense here since there is no contrast. We could say that GA is an accomplished scholar and also a poet and a philosopher. Or we could say that GA is not only an accomplished scholar but also a poet and a philosopher.
But as given the sentence does not work. Also, parallelism will work better if "who unearths..." is followed by "who draws ..." instead of "drawing."

Option (E) - GA, a world-class chef ..., is an accomplished scholar who unearths..., a poet and philosopher drawing ...
If we were to create a list of three things, this is how we could have done it - an accomplished scholar, a poet and a philosopher. The 'a' before philosopher is missing. Also, parallelism will work better if "who unearths..." is followed by "who draws ..." instead of "drawing."

Answer (C)
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IMHO, C.

A. 'Not only' is incorrectly placed.
B. The pattern of the sentence is X is scholar .......... and a poet & philosopher who.....,
For the sentence to be parallel , there should be a "who" after scholar.
B violates parallelism.

C. correct

D. not only is not present, a hanging "but also" is used

E. unearths..., drawing ..., is not parallel.

A - not only X but also Y. X and Y should be parallel and similar in construction. X - unearthing many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts is not parallel to Y - a poet and philosopher who draws his inspiration from the idyllic frescoes of Etruscan tombs.

B - ‘unearthing’ is wrong usage, gives rise to a phrase without a verb which is not parallel to what follows ‘as well as’ which has a verb. ‘who draws’ not parallel to ‘unearthing’, as well as after comma is not perfect. X as well as Y. X and Y should be parallel.

C - Seems CORRECT. X as well as Y. X and Y is perfectly parallel.

D - ‘but also’ is used incorrectly. Correct idiom is ‘not only .. but also ..’. ‘drawing’ used as adjective cause two sides of as well as to become un parallel.

E - ‘a poet and philosopher drawing ..’ changes meaning of sentence by shifting focus to poet and philosopher, while Alessi is primarily a poet and philosopher.

the subject is Alessi (sing.) not poet and philosopher. So if we asks, who draws? the answer is Alessi. A poet and a philosopher are not drawing. 'Poet and philosopher' are two things Alessi is considered.

A. not only unearthing many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts but also a poet and philosopher who draws
B. unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws
C. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws
D. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, but also a poet and a philosopher drawing
E. unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, a poet and philosopher drawing

Ans C wins hands down

Is B also wrong because of the construction : noun + verbing

'scholar+unearthing'
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Hi Sachin,

Choice B reads - unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws

This construction violates teh parallelism in the sentence. The senetnce says Giuseppe Alessi is a scholar and also a poet and philisopher. Then the sentence presents additonal information about Alessi as a scholar and a s a poet and philosopher. The entities in the parallel are "an accomplished scholar unearthing..." and "a poet and a philosopher who draws...". Verb-ing modifier phrase "unerathing..." is not grammatically parallel to relative pronoun clause "who draws...". This choice would be correct if "who draws..." were "drawing...".

Choice C corrects the parallelism by making both the entities relative pronoun clauses.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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Hi Shraddha,
Thanks for responding. My question specifically is about the construction: noun+verbing.. Is it right? comma + verb-ing should either act as a modifier or verbing should be used to describe the present continuous tense IMHO.

Giuseppe Alessi is an accomplished scholar unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts.

Is the above sentence grammatically correct? Kindly clarify.
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Hi Sachin,

When verb-ing modifier is preceded by a comma, then it modifies the preceding clause and takes the tense of the verb of the modified clause. When verb-ing modifier is used without a comma, then it modifies the preceding noun. This is a valid construction.

In this official sentence, "unearthing..." modifes "scholar".

You can refer to this article for uasge of Verb-ings modifiers:
usage-of-verb-ing-modifiers-135220.html
verb-ing-modifiers-part-2-in-our-first-article-on-verb-ing-135567.html

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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If you skip all the crap after Alessi, it becomes apparent that you need scholar who. With the remaining choices, D is introducing contrast where it isn't intended. C is parallel a scholar a poet, and also captures the intended meaning.

Farrell Dyan Hehn, MBA
Admissions Consultant & Verbal Tutor MBAPrepCoach.com
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HI GMATNinja , mikemcgarry , RonPurewal , DmitryFarber , MagooshExpert (Carolyn), ccooley

Is it wrong because there is no not only?
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Hi egmat and daagh , isnt Verb+ing incorrect here? Verb+ing takes the tense of the sentence. Here the sentence is in Present tense and hence the usage of Verb+ing gives the meaning that "Subject is unearthing many of his recipes" right now as we speak.

Darshak



1. We have verb+ ing in choices A and B, D and E. For all these present participles, the subject is only Giuseppe Alessi.

The participles themselves have no tense. If you want to assign a sense of present tense for them, they should have been preceded by the present tense auxiliary verb "is'

But could you also see that these four choices are miserable failures of parallelism? The only choice to have good parallelism, i.e. C, is the correct choice.

Generally, I feel that there is no need to go into the meaning of a choice if it is a blatant, grammatical wreck.


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1st Split: "not only unearthing" and "but also a poet and philosopher"
2nd split: "who draws"

A. not only unearthing many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts but also a poet and philosopher who draws

B. unearthing many of his recipes both from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws

C. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, as well as a poet and a philosopher who draws.------>a poet and a philosopher need to be parallel to "an accomplished scholar"---->Here the correct answer

D. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, but also a poet and a philosopher drawing

E. who unearths many of his recipes from medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, a poet and philosopher drawing

ArtVandaley
So you're talking about B? In that construction, the -ing modifier would have to modify the noun "scholar" to limit down what kind of scholar we're talking about. That's not very clearly done here, and I think that would crush B all on its own. C draws a clear parallel--a scholar who does X and a poet who does Y. We also have a parallelism problem in B: if we see "both from X," we have to have "and from Y."
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In option C , G.Alessi is an accomplished scholar who unearths ...., as well as a poet & a philosopher who draws .....

In option E , G.Alessi is an accomplished scholar who unearths ...., a poet & philosopher drawing....
I chose E as the correct answer as i thought G Alessi has 3 different roles 1. Scholar , 2. Poet & 3. Philosopher. I would like to understand why option E is wrong here.
Is it because of the parallelism i.e scholar who wants ..... philosopher drawing ....
or a is missing before philosopher.

GMATNinja

Abhishekrao12
If we wanted a list in E, we'd need to say "a scholar, a poet, and a philosopher." If we say "a scholar, a poet and philosopher," we just have the beginning of a list: 1) a scholar, 2) a poet and philosopher. In other words, we have an incomplete sentence! Putting ", a" before "philosopher" would clarify that we are listing three different things and save the sentence. Both of those little things are very necessary. The comma is needed because the GMAT uses the Oxford comma before "and" to end a list, and the "a" is needed, because we can't say "Alessi is philosopher."

As for interpreting the author's intent, notice that if we separate out "poet and philosopher," we'd have a bit of an odd sentence. We'd be saying that Alessi is a scholar who does X and a philosopher who does Y, and it between we'd just be mentioning offhand that he is also a poet, with no commentary. The OA makes more sense: he is a philosopher who does X and a poet/scholar who does Y. The "draws inspiration" part now applies to his work as both a poet and a philosopher.
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