A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer’s Cane has been

Question

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written by  Black Americans—the others being Richard Wright, author of  Native Son , and Ralph Ellison, author of  Invisible Man  .

(A) Black Americans—the others being Richard Wright, author of  Native Son , and Ralph Ellison, author of  Invisible Man

(B) Black Americans—including  Native Son  by Richard Wright and  Invisible Man  by Ralph Ellison

(C) a Black American—including Richard Wright, author of  Native Son , and Ralph Ellison, author of  Invisible Man

(D) a Black American—the others being Richard Wright, author of  Native Son , and Ralph Ellison, author of  Invisible Man

(E) a Black American—the others being Richard Wright’s  Native Son  and Ralph Ellison’s  Invisible Man

daagh · Accepted Answer

Why in spite of stating the names of the three authors, GMAT prefers to use the term, a Black American, is a riddle. It may be because a Black American notionally stands as a generic name for all the Black American authors. But GMAT seems to have ignored that point and gone for some subtle //ism by choosing E.

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer's Cane has been one of the three best novels ever written by  Black Americans-the other being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man.

a. Black Americans-the other being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man ------  wrong comparison between a book and some humans

B.Black Americans-including Native Son by Richard Wright and Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison --- T oomer’s Cane should be matched by equally parallel Richard Wright’s Native Son and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and not by the prepositional possessive using - by-.
 
c.a Black American-including Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man ---  wrong comparison; same as in A 
 
d.a Black American-the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man –  wrong comparison; same as in A and C 
 
e.a Black American-the others being Richard Wright's Native Son and Ralph Elision’s Invisible Man ---  correct parallelism, possibly the best among the lot , in spite of the prickly “ A Black American”

chetan2u · Answer

Hi..

Firstly the Q must have been discussed and you would readily get answers to your queries.

Now WHY E wins over B..
1) we are talking of a novel being written by indls so a black American is better than black Americans.
2) parallelism:- Toomer's cane is PARALLEL with Wright's native son ..
3) we are talking of 3 novels and in second part we have listed out the other two. INCLUDING means there are other novels apart from these three. So " the others" is better than " including"
So E

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem: 
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended core meaning of this sentence is that Jean Toomer’s Cane has been called one of the three best novels ever written by a Black American, and Richard Wright’s Native Son and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man are also among the three best novels ever written by a Black American.

Concepts tested here: Meaning

A:  The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "three best novels ever written by Black Americans"; the construction of this phrase incorrectly implies that Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written,   specifically  , by   multiple   Black Americans; the intended meaning is that Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written by   any number     of Black Americans,   in general  . Moreover, Option A further alters the meaning of this sentence through the phrase "the others being Richard Wright...and Ralph Ellison"; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that   Richard Wright   and   Ralph Ellison   are also among the three best novels written by a Black American; the intended meaning is that   Native Son   and   Invisible Man   are also among the three best novels written by a Black American.

B:  The sentence formed by this answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "three best novels ever written by Black Americans"; the construction of this phrase incorrectly implies that Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written,   specifically  , by   multiple   Black Americans; the intended meaning is that Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written by   any number     of Black Americans,   in general  . Moreover, Option B further alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "including Native Son by Richard Wright and Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison"; the construction of this phrase leads to an incoherent meaning; the intended meaning of this part of the sentence is that  Native Son  and  Invisible Man  are also among the three best novels written by a Black American.

C:  This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "including Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man"; the construction of this phrase leads to an incoherent meaning; the intended meaning of this part of the sentence is that  Native Son  and  Invisible Man  are also among the three best novels written by a Black American.

D:  This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase "the others being Richard Wright...and Ralph Ellison"; the construction of this phrase illogically implies that   Richard Wright   and   Ralph Ellison   are also among the three best novels written by a Black American; the intended meaning is that   Native Son   and   Invisible Man   are also among the three best novels written by a Black American.

E:  The sentence formed by this answer choice uses the phrases "one of the three best novels ever written by a Black American" and "the others being ... Native Son  and... Invisible Man ", conveying the intended meaning - that Jean Toomer’s  Cane  has been called one of the three best novels ever written by   any number     of Black Americans,   in general  , and   Native Son   and   Invisible Man   are also among the three best novels written by a Black American.

Hence, E is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team

blueseas · Answer

Use of being is not always wrong on GMAT. Go through the below link in order to understand correct usage of being: https://gmatclub.com/forum/when-you-shou ... l#p1133958 hope it helps

tronghieu1987 · Answer

I don't understand why B is incorrect? 
The reason that Ron Purewal shows in the Manhattan forum is that "Native Son by Richard and Invisible Man by Ralph" is not parallel to "Jean Toomer's Cane". But I think is it necessary to make parallelism exactly word by word like this? Is Noun vs Noun not enough?

The other reason that I think why B is incorrect is that the usage of "including" right after "Black Americans" because it may make sense that "Including" modifies "Black Americans". But according to what I learn from e-GMAT SC course, Including definitely can jump over "Black Americans" to modify "Best Novels" if there is no ambiguity and "Black American" cannot be placed any else where. So I think choice B is the case.

egmat · Answer

Hi tronghieu1987, Thanks for posting your question here. :-)

I would reject answer choices B and C for the usage of "including". Now "including" is a noun modifier that should modify the preceding noun entity. However, it cannot jump over the prepositional phrase "by Black Americans" because it modifies the action denoted by the verb-ed modifier "written". It does not modify the noun entity "one of the three best novels". So here we can say that usage of "including" does leave a scope for some ambiguity. So choice B is ambiguous and Choice C presents incorrect comparison because the book has been compared to two novelists. Hope this helps. :-)

Thanks. SJ

OptimusPrepJanielle · Answer

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer's Cane has been called one of the three best novels ever written by  Black Americans-the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellision, author of Invisible Man.

The novel Cane was written by Jean Toomer. Since Jean Toomer is singular and should be followed by a singular noun (a Black American). Eliminate A and B.

As we are mentioning the three best novels, the novels and not the authors should follow. Eliminate C and D

daagh · Answer

After the correction, it is clear that E is the answer, since A, C and E wrongly compare a novel with some authors and B says a novel by some author and a novel by another author, rather than saying B’s novel and Y’s novel to structurally match the first one that says Tommer’s Cane.

stevekeating · Answer

The essential structure of the sentence could be simplified to “one of the three best novels ….
A the other
B including
C including
D the other
E the others
There are two other novels. Eliminate the singular “other” in A and D. “Including” implies there are still others in addition to the two mentioned (Native Son and Invisible Man). This is not true. Only E remains. Other reasons also lead to E, as many have pointed out. Simplifying sentences can bring you to the right answer quickly.

Blackfoot1992 · Answer

To clarify this, you have to see what is the including pointing to.

One of the three best novels by black Americans, including.

This implies that Cane includes the other two novels. This is plain wrong!!!

One of the three best novels by black Americans, the other being..

This clarifies that Cane is one and the other two are blah blah.

Hope this helps

daagh · Answer

Choice B is a problem because of using the inappropriate ‘including’ whether with the dash or without the dash. If we mean to have the dash, as an adverbial modifier, it will wrongly modify the book ' 'Cane’ as Blackfoot has pointed out. If you use it without the dash, then it will absurdly refer to Black Americans that include two novels

Skywalker18 · Answer

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer’s Cane has been called one of the three best novels ever written by  Black Americans—the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man .

A. Black Americans—the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - the sentence makes it clear that you're comparing novels, not their authors ; their second half mistakenly mention the people themselves as part of the comparison.
B. Black Americans—including  Native Son  by Richard Wright and  Invisible Man  by Ralph Ellison - (b) is not as parallel as (e), either. since the original says "jean toomer's cane", the others should also have the form "X's Y", not "Y by X".
C. a Black American—including Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - same as A
D. a Black American—the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - same as A
E. a Black American—the others being Richard Wright’s Native Son and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man - Correct

Answer E

suramya26 · Answer

how did we figure out that a black american is correct and not Black Americans??

Kurtosis · Answer

(A) Black Americans—the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - The list considered here is the novels. So we need novels to be in parallel.

(B) Black Americans—including Native Son by Richard Wright and Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison - The list should be parallel to Jane Toomer's Cane. Richard Wright's Native son and Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man would be a better option.

(C) a Black American—including Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - Repeats the error in A

(D) a Black American—the others being Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man - Repeats the error in A

(E) a Black American—the others being Richard Wright’s Native Son and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man - Correct.

Answer: E

AliciaSierra · Answer

suramya26 , In non underlines portion author's name Jean Toomer is mentioned. Novel cane is written by only one author. You can find best explanation in below site. https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... t6725.html Ron, as always, has given best explanation.

seed · Answer

(A) Black Americans— the others being Richard Wright,  author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man  - Incorrect. Wrong comparison.

(B) Black Americans— including  Native Son by Richard Wright and Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison  - Incorrect.

(C) a Black American— including  Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man  - Incorrect.

(D) a Black American— the others being Richard Wright , author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man  - Incorrect. Wrong comparison.

(E) a Black American—the others being  Richard Wright’s Native Son  and  Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man   - Correct. Parallelism.

Answer: (E).

NAvinash · Answer

chetan2u ,  GMATNinjaTwo ,  egmat  - I got this question correct for a valid reason. What I am still wondering the usage of 'Black American' vs ' A Black American' . Am I correct in understanding that 'A black american' gives meaning of out of many black american   ? And what should follow in this sentence to make meaning with 'one of the'...?

PierreWU · Answer

Em dash: Twice as long as the en dash, the em dash can be used in place of a comma, parenthesis, or colon to enhance readability or emphasize the conclusion of a sentence. For example, She gave him her answer - No!
Whether you put spaces around the em dash or not is a style choice. Just be consistent.

HasnainAfxal · Answer

(A) Black Americans—the others being  Richard Wright , author of Native Son, and  Ralph Ellison , author of Invisible Man

(B) Black Americans— including  Native Son by Richard Wright and Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

(C) a Black American— including  Richard Wright, author of Native Son, and Ralph Ellison, author of Invisible Man

(D) a Black American—the others being  Richard Wright , author of Native Son, and  Ralph Ellison , author of Invisible Man

(E) a Black American—the others being  Richard Wright’s Native Son  and  Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer’s Cane has been

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

A mixture of poems and short fiction, Jean Toomer’s Cane has been

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