OFFICIAL EXPLANATION



THE PROMPT


• Meaning?
Thomas Nast or his cartoons or even both played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.

If intended meaning is not immediately apparent, do not panic.
We can glean intended meaning from the options.
In the end, the grammatical sentence left standing tells us the intended meaning.

Option A does not determine intended meaning. I address the issue in Notes, below, and link you to posts that contain analysis and evidence.
This urban legend dies hard.

• relative pronouns (whose)
→ As I have mentioned, if you see a relative pronoun (usually that, who, and which, but also whom or whose), start looking for at least two working verbs in the sentence, because a relative pronoun is the subject of a clause and requires its own verb.
Once that verb is "eaten up" by the relative pronoun, the verb cannot be used by the main subject.

I wrote about how to cope with relative pronouns and modifiers in a bit more depth this post, below.

THE OPTIONS


• missing verb
→ strip the sentence of its nonessential modifiers. Anything set off by commas is fair game.
Original: Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and these cartoons played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.[/i]

Stripped: Thomas Nast . . . and these cartoons played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.
→ No verb exists for Thomas Nast. We have a fragment.
Okay, his cartoons did X and Y.
But those cartoons are referenced in a nonessential clause that ends with Newsweek, a clause that we can remove.
The main subject, Thomas Nast, still needs a verb.
ELIMINATE A


• fatally placed modifier or incomplete verb
→ If the word published is supposed to be an adjective that describes cartoons (a participle phrase derived from a reduced relative clause),
then published should be much nearer to cartoons, the noun it modifies, and certainly should not come after the first main verb.

→ In fact, published looks as though it might modify corruption, a setup that is nonsensical.

→ If the word published is supposed to be a verb parallel to called and played, then we need the helping verb were (as in, were published) in order to maintain parallelism among called, WERE published, and helped.
Those three are the simple past tenses in parallel.

Cartoons do not publish themselves, so we must say were published.
In the case of a verb for which it would make no sense to use the active tense with that subject, it is okay to mix a passive tense among active tenses because your hand is forced.

The word published is a horribly misplaced modifier (an adjective) or a non-parallel verb. Either way, the sentence fails.
ELIMINATE B


• insensible modifier or missing verb
→ The verb called cannot belong to Nast or the modifier becomes nonsensical.
True, nonessential modifiers can be "removed," but those modifiers still must make sense.

→ The verb calledcan belong to only one subject.

If called belongs to Nast, then the modifier makes no sense.
The relative pronoun clause lacks a verb. Not okay.

If called belongs to Nast, we are left with:
. . . whose cartoons, published in leading newspapers and magazines . . .[DID WHAT?]
That relative clause subject "whose cartoons" lacks a verb and makes no sense.

→ published is not a verb.
In this instance it is a past participle (a verbED)—an adjective that describes cartoons.
We know that published is a past participle and not a past tense verb because
(1) commas do not come directly between subjects and verbs
(2) cartoons cannot publish themselves and would be required to take the verb were published, which is not what we have.
→ Let's restate: If called belongs to Nast, then whose cartoons is the subject of a relative clause, needs a verb, and does not have one.

→ Alternatively, give called to whose cartoons, and "remove" the whole nonessential clause.
Now Nast, the main subject, has no verb. Also not okay. Remove the whole nonessential clause starting with COMMA + whose.

→ We are left with:
Thomas Nast . . .
→ No verb for the main subject. (No sentence at all.)
ELIMINATE C


• Parallelism error
→ The verbs called and published are not parallel.
Cartoons cannot publish themselves.
We must use were published.
Were published would be parallel to called.
ELIMINATE D


• I do not see any errors
• This option correctly provides the verb played to Nast and creates a sensible whose-clause
• The sentence is grammatical, coherent, and easy to follow.
KEEP

The answer is E.

NOTES

dushyantkanal , you raise a good question about answers that depart from the meaning set out in option A.
The issue causes a lot of confusion.
I know that some test prep companies still teach that we cannot change option A or that option A determines the intended meaning.
All of you will read dozens of posts about the sanctity of option A.

They are all mistaken. No kidding.
Option A does not determine intended meaning.

I have written dozens of posts about this issue.
Other experts have written about this issue.

For a thorough analysis, take a look at this recent post, here in which I cite to two other pertinent posts I wrote, including one that contains official question examples in which option A could not possibly be the intended meaning.

COMMENTS

ganeshadepu1801 , siddharthkapoor , and dushyantkanal , welcome to SC Butler.
I am glad to see new faces these days and hope others will join in, too.

warrior1991 , as always, my friend, you are gracious. Thank you for the kind words.

sumitkrocks and zhanbo, good dialogue.
sumitkrocks , your post here nicely summarizes the accurate and strategic approach to meaning.

This thread is good.
If I were an aspirant, I would read it.

Analysis in posts ranges from very good to outstanding.
Today I will award kudos to all: some for bravery, some for correct answers and excellent analysis.

IMO, the answer is C.
Option D lacks "were" before "published"

My answer is (E). It took me 01:32.

(A) Before the "Comma + and", "Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek" is not an independent clause but a name followed by a nonrestrictive relative clause.

(B) "published in leading newspapers and magazines" modifies "corruption". The antecedent for "they" can be ambiguous.

(C) Not a sentence. "whose cartoons ... to justice" modifies "Thomas Nast".

(D) should be "and were published".

Good question! I’ll go with A

Let’s break it down!
whose refers to Thomas Nast
called for ... and were published refers to cartoons
including Newsweek refers to magazines
and these cartoons here and acts as a connector.

A looks good let’s keep it!

B The main subject is cartoons. Here published creates a problem as it should be followed by a verb to refer to cartoons. In this sentence published refers to corruption .. that’s wrong! Eliminate

C This is just a fragment. Lacks verb prior published and called Eliminate

D This too requires a verb after the connector and. published simply acts as a modifier as it lacks verb. Eliminate

E This looks good. But the question is played refers to what? cartoons OR Thomas Nast. Eliminate

Posted from my mobile device

Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and these cartoons played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.

A) No verb for subject "Thomas Nast"-eliminate

B) Modifier "published in leading newspapers and magazines" is modifying corruption -eliminate

C) No Main verb-Same issue as in A

D) Parallelism issue - clause and adverbial phrase can not be parallel
"Were published.." would have made this sentence legitimate.

E) Correct choice gametically; However, until I reached this option, I was under impression that his cartoons played key role not Thomas Nast directly.

(E) is the best

zhanbo
could you please share your view on whether Thomas Nast or his cartoons played key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice per intended meaning

sumitkrocks , watch the modifiers. If meaning is not clear at the outset, intended meaning is determined by the option that is grammatical and whose meaning makes sense (i.e., its "meaning" in both dependent and independent clauses).

Elsewhere I have mentioned that aspirants should be on the alert when they see a relative pronoun such as who, that, or which, but also whom and whose (two other forms of who).

In particular, watch the verbs. Relative pronouns require their own verb or verbs.
Whose refers to an immediately preceding noun and will be followed by a noun. That second noun is the subject of a whose-clause and requires a verb..
→ The Phoenicians, whose well-made sailboats helped them travel widely, dominated ancient trade for almost 1,000 years.
→ whose refers to the Phoenicians and conveys that the sailboats were owned by the Phoenicians. The word sailboats takes the verb helped. Phoenicians takes the verb dominated.
Once a verb is "eaten up" by the relative pronoun, it cannot be paired with ("used by") the main subject.

I realize that this answer might sound circular.

Try both

(1) stripping away nonessential modifiers and

(2) making sure that the nonessential modifiers make sense. (True, nonessential modifiers can be excised from a sentence, but they still must make sense on their own.)

If you cannot decide between two options because an error does not jump out at you, risk going with "style": diction; clarity and concision of expression; and flow.

I hope that answer helps.

Posted from my mobile device
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generis

Before posting my answer, I would like to take a moment and 'Thank You' for what you are doing for this community!! Zillion kudos to you my friend.

Coming to the question at hand, this question is really good and I absolutely loved solving it.

I took me 1:31 mins and in my opinion E should be the correct answer.


Meaning:-
1.Thomas Nast made cartoons.
2. His idea was to end corruption through his cartoons.
3. The cartoons were published in leading newspaper and magazines, including Newsweek.
4. He played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.


A) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and these cartoons played
This is a 'Run-on' sentence. If you remove everything after comma,the sentence will look like :-
Thomas Nast,and these cartoons played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice
This is absolutely incorrect.


B) Thomas Nast’s cartoons called for an end to corruption, published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and they played
The sentence is trying to create parallelism but in-turn makes it look horrible.AS soon as I read the whole sentence, I eliminated it.
Very awkward construct in my opinion. Plus the 'they' at last is also not a correct.
Incorrect

C) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons, published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, called for an end to corruption and played
This is again a sentence which many of us will say is written correctly.
Look closely, it was not Thomas Nast who called for an end to corruption.
The cartoons are playing a major role through which he tried to end corruption.
Incorrect.

D) Thomas Nast’s cartoons called for an end to corruption and published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, playing
the -ing form playing is incorrect because neither it is trying to give us any additional information about the preceding clause nor it is leading to a result. Incorrect.

E) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, played
This is correct.This is matching with the meaning I mentioned above and is nicely written.
Correct.

IMO E.
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sumitkrocks
Both you and I consider (E) to be the best answer. In (E), it is Thomas Nast who played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.

In other sentences, if their grammatical errors were rectified, they might suggest that Thomas Nast's cartoons played the key role.

Either interpretation is acceptable. We need to bear in mind that, while we should be able to tell reasonable meanings from preposterous ones, we cannot tell which meaning is the intended meaning. Whatever meaning is putatively conveyed in option (A) is not the intended meaning against which other options are evaluated. To put it another way, because we cannot pretend to know the intended meaning of a sentence, we do not eliminate options based on their meaning changes (as long as their meanings are reasonable).

Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and these cartoons played a key role in bringing several corrupt politicians and their associates to justice.

A) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and these cartoons played
- Missing verb for Subject "Thomas Nast"

B) Thomas Nast’s cartoons called for an end to corruption, published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, and they played
- Illogical meaning "corruption published in ........."

C) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons, published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, called for an end to corruption and played
- Missing verb for Subject "Thomas Nast"
- Not conveying clear meaning

D) Thomas Nast’s cartoons called for an end to corruption and published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, playing
- cartoons doing the action of "published" - Meaning error

E) Thomas Nast, whose cartoons called for an end to corruption and were published in leading newspapers and magazines, including Newsweek, played
- CORRECT

Thank you generis zhanbo Much appreciate your helpful responses.

While understanding the intended meaning of the question is crucial, it is always not certain that given stem with non underlined and underlined portions acts as reference for picking logical meaning. There may be multiple logically correct and slightly different meanings. Task is to find THE ONLY ONE that captures logic with correct grammar.

Hi Guys

Tough choice between D and E

IMO D is the correct answer and here’s why

The original sentence says the cartoons of Thomas nast played a key role and not the author Thomas nast himself

The meaning has to be verbatim in the gmat and hence I choose D over E

All other explanations are bang on in my opinion but we can’t choose an answer which changes what the first option is conveying.


Hence D

Posted from my mobile device

The official explanation is here.
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