Visitors to the Rodin Museum have often examined the

Question

Visitors to the Rodin Museum have often examined the enormous sculpture The Gates of Hell and  saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape  like black holes in the universe.

(A) saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape 
(B) saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths were gaping 
(C) saw figures clawing at the gates, with eyes and mouths gaping 
(D) seen figures who claw at the gates, their eyes and mouths gaping 
(E) seen figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths have gaped

pqhai · Accepted Answer

Hi animanga

"seen" is correct to make a sentence parallel. Let see the non-underlined part

Visitors to the Rodin Museum  have often examined  the enormous sculpture The Gates of Hell  and   seen  figures clawing at the gates............

" and " is parallel marker ==>  have examined || and (have) seen.  (present perfect tense)

If you use "saw", you mean simple past tense --> The sentence is not parallel.

Hope it's clear.

gmatter0913 · Answer

Yes, I understand that "whose" can refer to things and people.

But, on the GMAT, we many times (especially in cases of pronoun as it is not an absolute rule) check if the antecedent makes sense or not. There are many official examples where it is said as "as A an antecedent doesn't make sense, it is B that the pronoun is referring to...)

So, I thought as "gates" cannot have eyes and mouths, it has to modify "figures".

pqhai · Answer

HI gmatter Technically, modifier should provide a CLOSEST noun. So to tackle modifier problem, we should follow "touch" rule first. In this question, even though gates do not have eyes, the present of a middle man - gates - makes a sentence's meaning ambiguous. As you said: we have to check the antecedent to make sure it makes sense. Yes, you're correct. But before that the sentence's grammar must be correct first. Hope it's clear. Similar question to practice: visitors-to-the-park-have-often-looked-up-into-the-leafy-10435.html

animanga008 · Answer

Can someone explain seen vs saw?

gmatter0913 · Answer

Isn't the usage of "their" in option D a spot of concern? I thought it is definitely not clear if "their" is referring to "visitors" or "figures".

Also, can somebody point me to some good articles on "they" and "them".

Because all I know about "they" and "them" is that they are gender-neutral and strictly plural pronouns. But, it looks like I need to understand them more carefully, especially their usage in long sentences.

Shree9975 · Answer

chetan2u 
 souvik101990 
Isnt their in option D ambiguos.??
It shouldn't be the right answer choice.
Am i correct??

chetan2u · Answer

hi  Shree9975 ,
Visitors to the Rodin Museum have often examined the enormous sculpture The Gates of Hell and saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape like black holes in the universe.

(A) saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape 
(B) saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths were gaping 
(C) saw figures clawing at the gates, with eyes and mouths gaping 
(D) seen figures who claw at the gates, their eyes and mouths gaping 
(E) seen figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths have gaped

i'll give you two reasons why it is correct..
1) all other choices are clearly worse and this choice stands out as the correct answer. remember, we are told that we have to choose best available answer..
2) now specific to your question. why "their" is correctly refering back to figures...
here we have two nouns : one is subject-Visitors to the Rodin Museum. and second is object- figures...
"their" can be taken correctly referring to figures because their is a posssesive pronoun(therefore should refer to object in this case) and the construction of the sentence too points to this..
Ofcourse when we have only one noun, a subject, then 'their' would refer back to the subject if the meaning conveys so..
example:-
1) Visitors to the Rodin Museum have taken their luggage with them.  correct 
2) Visitors to the Rodin Museum were mesmerized by their ability to establish such a huge museum. Here , there is only one noun but clearly their does not refer to that noun.  
hope it helps

apoorv601 · Answer

Visitors to the Rodin Museum have often examined the enormous sculpture The Gates of Hell and saw figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape like black holes in the universe.

(A)  saw  figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths gape -  verb tense error  
(B)  saw   figures clawing at the gates, whose eyes and mouths were gaping  verb tense error  
(C)  saw  figures clawing at the gates, with eyes and mouths gaping  verb tense error  
(D)  seen   figures who claw at the gates,  their  eyes and mouths gaping -  Correct 
(E)  seen   figures clawing at the gates,  whose  eyes and mouths  have  gaped -  verb tense error  and  antecedent of whose is ambiguous

VyshakhR1995 · Answer

Can who refer back to figures in gmat?? I agree no other options fit in...In actual exam Who wont be referring to things right??

GMATNinja · Answer

VyshakhR1995, that's correct: "who" can only be used to modify people, not things. But keep in mind that "whose" is just a possessive modifier that can refer to people or things. So both of these would be OK:

The man whose hair is grey was happy before he started studying for the GMAT. 
The house whose paint is peeling can be purchased for just $80,000.

I hope this helps!

VerbalBot · Answer

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