Bunuel
The work of short fiction writer Charles Chesnutt reflects characteristic interests of his contemporary "local colorists"
as much as the intellectual ferment and historical reassessments of Black American culture during the late 19th century.
Consider the following example:-
Comparison is extremely tricky as much as enlightening.Because we (including me

) have the habit of using our ears to choose the correct option, we tend to neglect the ambiguous nature of the above example. Two completely different clauses can be derived from the previous example.
1. Comparison is extremely tricky as much as comparison is enlightening.
or
2. Comparison is extremely tricky as much as enlightening is extremely tricky.
Now we can see why a verb is required after the comparative words in order to explicitly mention the logical meaning.
Quote:
A. as much as the intellectual ferment and historical reassessments of Black American culture during the late 19th century
Therefore, from the above mentioned reasoning we can
eliminate Choice A.
Quote:
B. as much as it did the intellectual ferment in, and historical reassessments of, Black American culture in the late 19th century
Choice B removes the ambiguity of comparison but introduces "did" which is a past tense referring back to "reflects". We need a present tense after the comparative words because we are not sure whether "the reflection" got completed or is still ongoing. Per the meaning of the sentence, The reflection should be a stated truth. Hence,
remove B.
Quote:
C. as much as it had reflected, during the late 19th century, the intellectual ferment and historical reassessments of Black American culture
Choice C has a similar issue like B, where "had reflected" is used as a verb but past perfect tense is used in GMAT to keep the sequence of past tense verbs logical. Here we don't have any other past tense verbs, so we don't require "had reflected". Also, "during... 19th century" modifies "had reflected" but it should modify "Black American culture".
Eliminate C.Quote:
D. as much as it was reflective and characteristic of the intellectual ferment and historical reassessments of late 19th century Black American culture
Again a simple past "was" after "as much as", we don't really know whether the reflection happened in the past and we no longer see it or the reflection is a stated truth.
Choice D is gone.Quote:
E. as much as it does the intellectual ferment and historical reassessments of late 19th century Black American culture
This choice introduces the present tense "does" which removes the ambiguity of comparison as well as it removes the error in meaning, which was created by the usage of past tense in choices B, C & D.
Choose E.