What was as remarkable as the development of his distinctive brush str

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION




I have mentioned before that GMAC likes to deploy long prepositional phrases (or long noun descriptors) in order to throw you off your game.

Well, first, don't get thrown. Get even.
You can wade through this veritable sea of words:
. . . in the many sketches and watercolors van Gogh produced in his ten short years as an artist . . .

Eliminate words and paraphrase.
→ in the many sketches and watercolors [paintings] van Gogh produced in his ten short years as an artist
Here is the sentence, stripped:
→ What was as remarkable as the development of his distinctive brush strokes[/u] in the many paintings van Gogh produced has been the continued popularity of his letter sketches.

Second, notice as remarkable as.
Those italicized words are comparison words.
Skim the other answers quickly to see whether they, too, contain comparison words.
Yes. We see than in options C and D, and as in options B and E.

→ as ______ as and [something] than tell us that we are comparing two things.
Those items must be parallel.

The part of the comparison in the non-underlined portion dictates the form of the first part of the comparison.

• Split #1: comparison parallelism

The non-underlined portion of the comparison is the continued popularity of his letter sketches.
The underlined part about van Gogh's brush strokes must match that grammatical form.
→ The development of is parallel to the popularity of: we can eliminate options B and D, both of which use developing.

→ That is, options B and D use developing his distinctive brush strokes as the first part of the comparison.
Developing is not parallel to popularity.
Developing is a gerund, a verb-like noun (a verbING). It is not a "regular" or dedicated noun that resembles popularity.

In addition, a dedicated noun exists, one that we see in options A, C, and D: (the) development (of).

(I fixed the typo in option B, which originally said "develop." Neither develop nor developing is parallel to popularity.)
ELIMINATE B and D

• Split #2: Idiom error

We can say as remarkable as or no less remarkable than (no less . . . than).
We cannot say no less remarkable as.
Option E uses that incorrect construction.
(Option D, already eliminated, also fails idiomatically. None the less remarkable than is absolute babble in English. None the less is one idiom. No less remarkable than is another idiom. (D) botches both.)
ELIMINATE E

• Split #3: Verb tense parallelism

Option A pairs was (past tense) and has been (present perfect tense).
(Option B, already eliminated, does the same thing.)

At first, the verb tense shift may not seem problematic.
In many cases, we can shift verbs and maintain parallelism.
But parallelism is also grounded in logic.
In option A, essentially we have
→ What was remarkable . . . has been remarkable.
The non-underlined portion places us—and correct answer C—squarely in the present.

So let's say that option A still looks very tempting.

The verb tense in (A) shift is not necessary. That shift is confusing.
Vincent van Gogh's letters continue to be popular in the present.
That popularity has been remarkable and is still remarkable.
Similarly, the development of van Gogh's brush strokes has been and is still remarkable.

Option A should state, "What has been just as remarkable as the development of his distinctive brush strokes has been the continued popularity of van Gogh's letters." (We could also get away with "What is just as remarkable. . ..")

Both remarkable things are still remarkable.

Finally, if you cannot eliminate (A) on its own, compare (A) to (C).

Option C avoids the verb problem entirely. Avoiding problems entirely is a good idea.
Option C is better than option A.
ELIMINATE A

The correct answer is C.

This inverted structure is a challenge, but if we eliminate the four worst answers rather than searching for one best answer, we find that this question sorts itself out.

SPOILER ALERT: The official question on which this question is modeled can be found here.

COMMENTS

tyildirim92 , your comment about option C is funny. And true.

kush09 , I liked the way that you pointed out that "van Gogh's 'development of distinctive brush strokes' is compared with 'popularity of his letter sketches.'"

agar123 , you asked a good question, one that many people wondered about. Well done.

KaramveerBakshi , thank you for responding. Wanting to help is generous.

All four of you get kudos.