Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them

Hi TGC.,

In option B, there are two modifiers following each other and they both modify Beatrix Potter and this can be confusing and so it is better to avoid such a strcuture.

In the right answer choice "C", "which she carefully coordinated with her narratives" modifies "In her book illustrations" and "in her book illustrations" modifies "Beatrix Potter" and so structure is much clearer.

Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, capitalized on her keen observation and love of the natural world.
(A) Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives,
(B) In her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, Beatrix Potter
(C) In her book illustrations, which she carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter
(D) Carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations
(E) Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinated them with her narratives and

Meaning: BP capitalized on her keen observation and love of natural world in her book illustrations by carefully coordinating illustrations with her narratives.

POE:
In Option A) The modifier "carefully coordinating them with her narratives" is modifying "book illustrations" as if the book illustrations are coordinating with her narratives.

Option B) Same issue as above.

Option D) "Carefully coordinated with her narratives" -> After the verb-ed modifier, we have "Beatrix Potter". It seems as if the BP is the result of coordination.

Option E) The cause and effect is removed by making it as a list.

Option C) is correct

Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, capitalized on her keen observation and love of the natural world.

(A) Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, --> Verb tense coordinating - capitalized
(B) In her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, Beatrix Potter --> illustrations coodinate nothing, Beatrix is the Doer. Ing-modifier after a comma modifies the preceding clause -> In her book illustrations + wrong verb tense again
(C) In her book illustrations, which she carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter --> correct structure 1st modifies Beatrix, 2nd (which) modifies the illustrations. Correct Verb Tense --> coordinated and capitalizedbut
(D) Carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations --> Beatrix is not coordinated with narratives...rather illustrations
(E) Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinated them with her narratives and --> "in her book illustrations" is a prepositional phrase and it modifies Beartix here, it can not be the referent of THEM here.

One more cent from me:

We know that when two events in a sentence occurred at two different points of time in the past, we are generally required to use past perfect tense for the earlier event. Then why "coordinated" is not expressed in past perfect ("coordinated" occurred prior to "capitalized").

The answer is: we should use past perfect ONLY when we want to emphasize the sequence of the events and the sequence is not clear. Nonetheless, if the sequence is obvious, we often do not need to use past perfect. Another simpler example: I went to the supermarket and bought a pound of bread.

Repeating the same thing n number of times or spending in lakhs is not a solution to get to the mark. Its about how correct your approach is.

I think you actually should talk to some experts before proceeding as you are not clear on the strategy.

Moreover, after the lines "I have already convey my mother that in your oldage if you fall ill,please have a 10-15 sleeping pills and die neither I nor my siblings will be around her to take care", I really think you should reach out to a counselor soon.



D is incorrect because it has meaning issue. As I said before, you are not clear on the strategy.

So, my dear friend, Do as I suggested above.
_________________

kolheanup you may take a look at this one:
how-to-improve-your-verbal-score-213013.html#p1643215

Also please maintain the discussions relevant to the thread topic. In case you have other concerns please address in the respective forums or you may even send me a PM - frustration may flood in and get out of control at times - happens to almost all of us at some point. See this as well:

780-q50-v47-old-fogey-who-me-stop-kidding-boy-190828.html#p1462711

Manhattan GMAT SC Navigator Explanation.

Split1) Modifier. the structure of the original sentence is as follows: Subject + ,modifier 1, + modifier 2 + verb...This is problematic because the subject and the verb are too far apart. Modifier 1 = prepositional phrase = does not clearly modify the noun in the preceding phrase (Breatrix), what is modifier 1 supposed to modify? = something that takes place within the illustration? => in this case the best way to say this is: Beatrix Potter capitalized, in her book illustrations => that would be more logical because modifier 1 is referring to Breatrix in the original sentence and that's a weird construction. Modifier 2 refers back to "book illustrations", also uses the pronoun "them" which is looking back to "book illustrations" => this is wrong because "book illustrations" is part of a prepositional phrase (in her book illustrations) which is referring to something else that is not clear what. Very confusing structure. If you have two modifiers one after the other, it should be extremely clear what they both are referring to, this is not the case in the original sentence. A, B and E have this issue.

Split 2) Meaning. The intended meaning of the sentence is: Beatrix Potter coordinated her illustrations and her narratives, she coordinated between the two. In D) it says : "Coordinated with her narratives, Potter, in her book" = this choice says that Beatrix Potter is coordinated with her narratives = wrong meaning.

Although I chose C, I am not very convinced with "which she carefully....".

Should'nt it be "which were carefully coordinated...."

Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, capitalized on her
keen observation and love of the natural world.

A. Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives,
Placement of modifier phrase “carefully coordinating …” gives an impression that it modifies “book illustrations” …as that is the subject of the clause preceding the modifier phrase.

B. In her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, Beatrix Potter
Same error as A

C. In her book illustrations, which she carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter
Correct ans

D. Carefully coordinated with her narratives, Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations
Verb-ed modifier “carefully coordinates” illogically modifies the subject “Beatrix Potter”

E. Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinated them with her narratives and
Again, illogical meaning.
_________________

Both are alright:
In the first case, "which" is used as an object (the doer of the action (she) is the subject, "which" is the object - active voice).
In your example "which" is used as subject (hence passive voice - doer of the action (she) is NOT the subject). Another example:

I have a pet dog, which my mother does not like. Correct (the relative clause is in active voice - "which" object of the clause).
I have a pet dog, which is not liked by my mother. Correct (the relative clause is in passive voice - "which" subject of the clause).

I have missed this question twice now. I still do not understand what is wrong with E. I have read all of the comments and explanations. None of them clearly convey what is wrong with E.

"them" clearly refers to "illustrations." There is no pronoun ambiguity.

Some say if you take away "in her book illustrations" then the "them" will not refer to anything. Okay, same goes with (C). If we take away "in her book illustrations", then "which she carefully coordinated..." does not make any sense.

I need an experts' explanation please. GMATNinja

Hi,

Why is Option E wrong ?

Thanks !

EMPOWERgmatVerbal gives a great explanation of this question, including choice (E), in this post.

Adding to that explanation, let's see what happens when we replace "them" with its only logical referent in choice (E):

"Beatrix Potter, in her book illustrations, carefully coordinated her book illustrations with her narratives and capitalized on her keen observation and love of the natural world."

So she carefully coordinated her book illustrations IN her book illustrations?? That doesn't make any sense.

Compare that to choice (C):

"...in her book illustrations, she capitalized..." - This is the correct meaning. She capitalized on her keen observation and love the natural world IN her book illustrations.

(C) is a much better choice!
_________________

EducationAisle
Are you going to mean that consecutive modifiers, which modify the same thing, is not allowed in GMAT?
Appreciating your help...
_________________

Request Expert Reply:
Q1:
Is B ok if THEM is removed from the choice? It seems that everything feel ok after removing 'them' from choice B. Am I missing anything, experts?

Q2:
Can we cross out choice D because there is no COMMA after 'illustrations'? I mean-if we don't use COMMA after 'illustrations' then 'in her book illustrations' will not be considered as modifier, but 'in her book illustrations' is definitely a modifier.
Apart from meaning issue!
_________________

Well, while there are very few sacred cows on GMAT, multiple consecutive modifiers modifying the same entity should generally be avoided.
_________________

Hello MartyTargetTestPrep,
Would you mind giving us your opinion regarding answer choice B ?
I was between B and C and picked C , but I think that in B the non restrictive modifier is correctly modifying Beatrix Potter it is just not as efficient as C?

Here's the version created via the use of (B).

(B) In her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them with her narratives, Beatrix Potter capitalized on her keen observation and love of the natural world.

The modifier "carefully coordinating them with her narratives" is problematic in two ways.

One issue is that the participial phrase "carefully coordinating them with her narratives" has to modify the clause "Beatrix Potter capitalized ...." This modification is illogical, because it is not logical that Beatrix Potter would have capitalized on her keen observation and love of the natural world by or in the process of carefully coordinating her illustrations with her narratives. The two actions have little to do with each other. So, modifying the clause with the participial phrase results in the sentence's conveying a nonsensical meaning.

Secondly, "In her book illustrations, carefully coordinating them" is not logical. It modifies what Beatrix Potter did "in her book illustrations" by saying what she did to her book illustrations, "coordinating them." It does not make sense to mix discussion what she did in and to her illustrations in this manner.
_________________

Q1:
Is B ok if THEM is removed from the choice? It seems that everything feel ok after removing 'them' from choice B. Am I missing anything, experts?

Q.1: Coming to the question about whether removing the pronoun ‘them’ would solve the problem, no, I’m afraid it wouldn’t. If you refer to the explanation from egmat, you will see that the pronoun ‘them’ is part of a participle phrase that is supposedly modifying Beatrix Potter, but is actually an ambiguous modifier because of its placement. Because it is placed after one modifier – In her book illustrations – this modifier does not seem to have an appropriate subject. If we remove the pronoun, the modifier only becomes more confusing because then, we wouldn’t know what is being coordinated.
Option B also contains a modifier error. It contains two modifiers placed one after the other before the subject “Beatrix Potter” is mentioned. The modifiers are “In her book illustrations” and “carefully coordinating them with her narratives”. It is generally seen on the GMAT that when there are multiple modifiers describing one subject, the subject is placed in between the modifiers.

Q2:
Can we cross out choice D because there is no COMMA after 'illustrations'? I mean-if we don't use COMMA after 'illustrations' then 'in her book illustrations' will not be considered as modifier, but 'in her book illustrations' is definitely a modifier.
Apart from meaning issue!
Q.2:
The comma would definitely make the sentence clearer. The lack of the comma can be one reason to rule out the option though the stronger reason would the meaning conveyed by the modifier – carefully coordinated with her narratives. The use of the participle ‘coordinated’ implies that Beatrix Potter was the one that was coordinated with her narratives and not her illustrations, as is the intended meaning.

I hope this helps.

Jayanthi Kumar.
_________________