V08-16

Official Solution:

Nelson Mandela is the embodiment of endurance, extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination and finding himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court.

A. Nelson Mandela is the embodiment of endurance, extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination and finding himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court
B. Nelson Mandela, who is the embodiment of endurance, is extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination and finding himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court
C. Extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination, Nelson Mandela is the embodiment of endurance, finding himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court
D. Nelson Mandela, extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination and found himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court, is the embodiment of endurance
E. The embodiment of endurance, Nelson Mandela, who was extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination and who found himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court


A. Two modifiers, “extant in time of ruthless government and civil discrimination” and “finding himself cast on the tender mercies of a corrupt court” are wrongly used in parallel. The first one, “extant”, is an adjective, whereas the second one, “finding”, is a present participle technically used as a verb modifier, i.e. and adverb - hence they cannot be parallel. B. Wrong parallelism. The verb “is” is wrongly used in parallel with the present participle “finding”.

C. CORRECT. The adjective modifier “extant…” correctly modifies the noun “Nelson Mandela”. The present participle “finding himself…” correctly modifies the preceding clause “Nelson Mandela is the embodiment of endurance” (technically the verb “is” of the preceding clause).

D. Wrong parallelism. The adjective “extant” is wrongly used in parallel with the verb “found”. There are two verbs in the sentence, “found” and “is”, without a conjunction to join them.

E. This sentence does not have a main verb. There are two relative clauses “who was…” and “who found…”, modifying the main subject “Nelson Mandela”, but the main verb is missing.


Answer: C