Replete with bloody revenge, disasters (both deserved and undeserved)

Question

Replete with bloody revenge, disasters (both deserved and undeserved) and agonizing moral dilemmas, the plots of tragedies also involve dramatic irony, where the audience recognizes the facts before  they are recognized by the play's characters themselves .

(A) they are recognized by the play's characters themselves

(B) the play's characters recognize the facts

(C) these facts are recognized by the play's characters

(D) being recognized by the play's characters

(E) the play's characters themselves do

generis · Accepted Answer

warrior1991  , nothing is seriously wrong with (B).
We have to eliminate (B) because it is not nearly as good as (E).
This question subtly tests meaning (of irony) and rhetorical effectiveness (at conveying that irony). The question is hard.

••   SHORT ANSWER  
The short answer is that reflexive pronouns highlight and emphasize subjects because English does not "repeat" subjects very often, 
and in this question the word "irony" signals that we need to emphasize the characters. Their situation is odd. 
Emphasizing the characters' ignorance comports with the IRONY mentioned; the characters who are actually living a horror story do not know that fact, while the people watching and not living a horror story -- the audience members --  do know .

Reflexive pronouns tell a reader, "Take note! This subject has something unusual going on—a weird situation, maybe, or a peculiar mindset."
 Themselves  adds emphasis to the play's  characters . Emphasis is part of what reflexive pronouns do.

Option E does a better job of contrasting clueless characters and clued-in audience members, a contrast that, in turn, reinforces the word "irony."

•• ANALYSIS

• Irony = contrary to expectation, opposite, contrast  
The key clause is  the plots of tragedies  also  involve dramatic  irony

Generally, irony suggests that something is opposite from or contrary to what we expect.

We need stark contrast between the audience and the characters in the play.

Take this part on faith for a moment:
-- Using the reflexive pronoun  themselves  as in (E) spotlights the characters' peculiar ignorance and contrasts it with the watchers' insight.
-- Failing to use the reflexive pronoun  themselves  as in (B) also fails to illuminate the contrast as effectively as (E) does.

• Reflexive pronouns 
Also discussed on  this site, here

SIMPLER EXAMPLES

--  The necessary case:   I  gave  myself  the epinephrine shot, which cured my severe allergic reaction. 
We use a reflexive pronoun (myself) as a recipient of the verb (as a direct object) when the subject of the verb and the object are the same (person or thing). I administer the shot as a subject. I receive the shot as an object.

-- The optional case (#2):
1) Correct but  not  as quick and hence not as effective as #2:  Rohan fixes things because he does not trust others to fix the problems correctly. 
2)  Correct and more effective than #1 :  Rohan fixes things  himself  because he does not trust others to fix the problems correctly.

In #1, we must wait until the end of the sentence to learn that Rohan has a particular reason for fixing things.
It's not all that clear that he refuses to let others help him. 
 Rohan fixes things  . . . (We are not aware that he has a mindset we should pay attention to.)

In #2, Rohan fixes things  himself . We know immediately that the  himself  is important.
 Himself  signals: pay attention to his mindset or situation. English doesn't "repeat" or reinforce subjects without reason.
Rohan fixes things  himself  ... now his "why" is  more easily absorbed  because we are ready for it.

In English, one common way to spotlight  the particular situation or state of mind of a subject  is to use the reflexive pronoun.

We can emphasize that we had no help: I fixed it by  myself .
We can emphasize particular attributes: An inanimate  thing itself  cannot draw a conclusion; only people draw conclusions. 
We can emphasize that a particular person did something:  Sir Elton John himself  sang for Queen Elizabeth's birthday. 
We can emphasize oddity, like the oddity in this question:  She herself  rarely received praise, though she was both accomplished and quick to praise others.
(It is odd and ironic that she both deserves praise and is generous with praise, but that she rarely receives praise.)

"THEMSELVES" IN THIS CASE

The people IN the story do not understand what the audience understands. Can't the characters  see  all the horrible things that are happening? Weird.
We use  themselves  to point a spotlight on and to point to  those  people IN the play who do not understand.

As a matter of convention,  themselves  emphasizes THE FACT THAT  those  people are  clueless   .

• Compare B to E in order to eliminate

At this level of question, we may well have two grammatical answers. We have to decide which one is more effective.

I see no basis to eliminate (B) on its own, unless we know
that idiomatically, we use reflexive pronouns for this kind of situation.

I would not eliminate (B) on its own regardless. Rhetoric and style issues require comparison.
One answer is better than the other.

We want to highlight our subjects' peculiar or unusual situation or state of mind.

(B) The horrifying plots of dramatic tragedies ... also involve dramatic irony, 
where the audience recognizes the facts before  the play's characters recognize the facts .

(E) The horrifying plots of dramatic tragedies ... also involve dramatic irony, 
where the audience recognizes the facts before  the play's characters themselves do .

Which option refers to and illuminates  irony  better?

If the answer still seems elusive and abstract, 
then we memorize this fact: reflexive pronouns emphasize.
If two sentences are almost identical,
but one emphasizes something and the other does not, we should ask: 
do we need the emphasis? Why is there emphasis in one of the sentences?

If we are trying to showcase a subject in an odd position, reflexive pronouns work.
 Correct :  I myself  do not understand this book at the moment, and I wrote half of it!
(State of affairs: weird. The author has forgotten what s/he knew enough to write about.)

Another avenue: Google  reflexive pronouns English example sentences  and read correct examples for 30 minutes. The concept will sink in.

Finally,  HERE is a very good Magoosh blog post with examples.

I hope that analysis helps.

chetan2u · Answer

Hi,
PL provide the Q with OA...

The MAIN error here is   parallelism issue in terms of voice in portion on either side of BEFORE. . 
The non-underlined portion - the audience recognizes the facts- has 'the facts' as OBJECT and there is no reason to convert the portion as passive after BEFORE..
It is much better to use SAME voice ..
ONLY B and E are left..

In B,  the reflexive pronoun THEMSELVES is missing , while E carries it correctly..
Also  DO in E is a much better thing than to repeat the word s- the facts- again.. Not something which can alone separate two chopices..

E

jogianni · Answer

Why is themselves necessary? wouldn't "before they are recognized by the play's characters." work?

leanhdung · Answer

Replete with bloody revenge, disasters (both deserved and undeserved) and agonizing moral dilemmas, the plots of tragedies also involve dramatic irony, where  the audience  recognizes  the facts  before  they are recognized by the play's characters themselves .

A.  they  are recognized by the play's characters  themselves 
--> "they" and "themselves" must have the same antecedant if they stand in the same clause. Active voice is preferred if available.

B. the play's characters recognize  the facts 
--> redundant.

C. these  facts  are recognized by the play's characters
--> redundant. Active voice is preferred if available.

D.  being recognized  by the play's characters
--> it is implicitly understood that the subject of  being recognized  is "the audience" --> wrong.

E. the play's characters themselves do
--> correct and concise.

thangvietname · Answer

this is hard question. the points tested here are passive voice and pronoun problem.

passive voice is used when the agent which make the action is not important. only the action and object of action is important. in this context, the agent of action, "play characters" are important. so, passive voice should not be used. choice C is inferior to Choice E. the passtive voice is only incorrect when the active voice is present and is considered better when the agent is important. when agent is important, it should be subject of the sentence. when only action and object of action is important, passive is used. that is all about passive and active difference.

regarding pronoun problem. 
I like the apple and my friends also like the apple.
if we do not use pronoun. the sentence become unclear. it is possible that there are two apples. I Like apple A and you like apple B. This is serious meaning problem if you do not use pronoun. so, the use of pronoun make the meaning clear: there is only one apple. for all those reasons, choice B is wrong.

thangvietname · Answer

normally, when passive voice is used, agent which makes action is not shown because the speakers is not willing to say about this agent. if passive voice contain agent at the end of sentence, this agent becomes redundant because the speaker at this moment do not want to focus on agent. if agent is the focus of the sentence, this agent should be the grammatical subject of the sentence and the sentence should be an active voice.

teaserbae · Answer

daagh 
Can you please brief the difference between B and E ?

thangvietnam · Answer

choice D, being refers to audience . this is illogic clearly
in choice A, "they" is unclear..
look at choice B and C.
we use passive if we want to emphasis not the agent making the action but the action/fact performed by the agent. inhere, we want to emphasis agent not what agent do, so, active is better than passive, C is gone/

we dont repeat a noun but we have to use pronoun. B is gone

two problems with choice B and C is subtle and will not tested on gmat frequently. this make this question hard

teaserbae · Answer

daagh   AjiteshArun 
Can you please brief the difference between option B and E ?

daagh · Answer

teasarbae 
In B, where the audience recognizes the facts before the play's characters recognize the facts -- the repetition of 'recognize the facts' is redundant and awkward

stonepam · Answer

I find it hard to understand this because Kaplan has similar questions that seem to use these repetitions.

warrior1991 · Answer

generis

What's wrong with option B?? I don't think B is wrong in any sort.

I know that E is also correct but we have to discard B on the basis of any reason. I am not able to find that reason.

Please help !!

dabaobao · Answer

GMATNinja daagh egmat EducationAisle I would really appreciate if someone could help me clear my doubt regarding ellipsis. Thanks! I understand why E is superior to all other choices but I ruled it out due to one issue: ellipsis. The audience recognizes the facts before the play's characters themselves do (recognize) "recognize" is missing since "recognizes" != "recognize". I know that there's a rule that all words in ellipsis should be present somewhere else in the sentence. How can we get away without the exact verb present somewhere else? In contrast, for example (Ellipsis with sentences without DO), in this Q: https://gmatclub.com/forum/inflation-ha ... ml?kudos=1, we do need the exact verb tense. Wrong: They still expect to live better than their parents have (Missing: "lived". Need "did (live)" instead of "have") Another example (Ellipsis with sentences with DO): Wrong: She went to school before all children do (Missing: "go". Need "did (go)" instead of "do" but no "go"????)

generis · Answer

dabaobao  , I will let the experts you have tagged reply about this question.
But you are a little mixed up about my post that you cite.
It's easy to get mixed up about ellipsis and substitution.

When verbs shift tenses in a sentence, we have two choices.
We can write out both verbs in their entirety, this way:
 Marisol works harder in college than Reva worked when Reva was in college.

Or we can use the appropriate form of  to do  because that verb can stand in for almost any verb. (Exceptions are below.)
We write the "to do" substitute verb in the tense that we need.
 Marisol works harder in college than Reva did. 
DID = WORKED

Don't test correctness by seeing whether you can write  did (works) . 
Just ask whether  did  equals  worked . Are both verbs past tense so that they refer properly to Reva, who is finished with college?
Yes,  did  and  worked  are both past tense.

The one verb that you  can  use when verb tenses shift is some form of TO DO (do, does, or did, usually).

When we use  do, does , and  did , we   do not   need exactly the same verb tense.
This situation is precisely the one in which we use  do, does , or  did. 
The  only  verb that will work to express a verb shift is some form of TO DO.

The verb tense needs to be present, yes, if we want to use pure omission (ellipsis).
If the second verb tense is not present, we either write out both verbs entirely or, using substitution, we write the "to do" verb that matches the tense we need.

IF we need a present tense verb (for the verb whose tense has shifted), then we use DO and DOES.
If we need a past tense verb (for the verb whose tense has shifted), then we use DID.

You seem confused about this part of the post:

DO stands in for a present tense verb.
DOES stands in for a present tense verb.
DID stands in for a past tense verb.

You wrote:
 
Not quite. Yes, "lived" is "missing." 
Yes, we use  did  to stand in for  lived  because both  did  and  lived   are past tense verbs.

We are not writing  did  in order to say "did live."
We are writing  did  in order to say "lived."
We are allowed to use  did  when the verb changes tenses and we do not want to write the whole verb out again.
 Did  is past tense.

You wrote
 
↓↓↓
Correct: She went to school before all the other children DID. 
Correct: She went to school before all the other children went to school.
DID = WENT TO SCHOOL

Both are past tense.
We are allowed to use  did  as shorthand for "went to school."
Just as is the case in this question, there is no verb tense shift in this example.
That fact is okay; we can still see how a "to do" verb stands in and makes a "short" version of the verb phrase "went to school."

We can use a TO DO verb when there is  not  a tense shift and we do not want to write out the second verb.
We can use a TO DO verb when there  is  a tense shift and we do not want to write out the second verb.

Finally, there are   two big exceptions   to the "do can stand in for almost any verb" guideline.

A TO DO verb  cannot  substitute for 
-- TO BE verbs, or 
-- HAVE, if HAVE is an auxiliary verb.
If  have  means  own, possess , or  experience , then  have  is a "main" verb and can be replaced with  do, does , or  did.

• TO DO verbs cannot substitute for TO BE verbs
 Wrong : She was hungry and he did, too.
 Correct : She was hungry and he was  , too.

• TO DO verbs cannot substitute for HAVE when HAVE is a helping/auxiliary verb
 Wrong : He had finished his wine and I did, too.
 Correct : He had finished his wine and I had, too.

• TO DO verbs  can  substitute for HAVE when HAVE is a main verb that means own, possess, or experience.
Correct: Artem has ten pennies and Misha has ten pennies.
Correct: Artem has ten pennies and Misha does, too. 
Correct: Artem has ten pennies just as Misha does.
 does = has

Correct (did can substitute for main verb had):
Artem had ten pennies and Misha had ten pennies.
Artem had ten pennies and Misha did, too.
Artem had ten pennies just as Misha did.
 did = had

I've added these exceptions to the post you cited.

I'll let the other experts you tagged take on this question.

daagh · Answer

Daba, 
I am afraid you are getting confused between ellipsis and replacement. Both are different. Ellipsis is when you totally avoid some feature, it need not be restated and the omission is easily understood. On the contrary in replacement, you don't omit anything. You only replace the earlier verb with another verb namely do or does or did or some such form in order to the clumsiness of repetition.

Your problem with E arose because you mistook the second verb 'do' as an ellipsis.

EducationAisle · Answer

Hi, actually  recognizes   is  equal to  recognize , from an  ellipsis  perspective.

For example, following sentence is correct:

My parents recognize the signs of disease better than she.

This is equivalent to:

My parents recognize the signs of disease better than she (recognizes).

So, while  change in tense  is generally an issue with ellipsis, change from a  plural  to a  singular subject (or vice-versa) is  not .

Correct for the most part; but the question under consideration in this thread  isn't  really changing the  tense ; it is just a question of  singular  subject in the first part vs  plural  subject in the second part.

This sentence is  not  using ellipsis.  do  is an actual verb that will substitute for  go .

Our book    EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana    discusses  this aspect of “to do” verbs . Have attached the corresponding section of the book, for your reference.

Basshead · Answer

While I correctly chose E, I had a hard time eliminating B.

GMATNinja , can you opine?

GMATNinja · Answer

Did you see @generis's  post  about (B)?

Let me know if that doesn't resolve your question!

Anchal270789 · Answer

Usage of where 
How do we justify the usage of 'where' in the non-underlined portion of the sentence. As per my understanding, where is used to modify place nouns and not situations. Experts please guide.

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Prep Toolkit

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

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