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In London that afforded its playrights

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In London that afforded its playrights

by gauravhesoyam » Fri Sep 06, 2013 10:34 am
In London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters, Alpha Behn, by 1687, had 17 of her plays staged in as many years.

A) In London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters,

B) In a London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters,

C) Even though London's playwrights only afforded two theaters,

D) Only two theaters were afforded by London to its playwrights, and

E) Two theaters only were afforded by London for its playwrights, and


Please help me with this question.
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by [email protected] » Fri Sep 06, 2013 3:41 pm
Hi gauravhesoyam,

This SC is based primarily on a "style" rule, but has two other grammar rules that can help you to choose the correct answer:

1) Pronoun - Since "London" is a singular city, this SC should have the word "its"
Eliminate C

2) Modification - the word "only" is modifying the number "two", so the best phrase is "only two" (as opposed to "two only").
Eliminate C (if you haven't done so already) and E

3) Active Voice - "London" should be as early in the sentence as possible.
Eliminate D and E

4) Style - "In a London that afforded its playwrights" is a grammatically correct style phrase.

Final Answer: B

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by vinay1983 » Fri Sep 06, 2013 7:27 pm
[email protected] wrote:Hi gauravhesoyam,

This SC is based primarily on a "style" rule, but has two other grammar rules that can help you to choose the correct answer:

1) Pronoun - Since "London" is a singular city, this SC should have the word "its"
Eliminate C

2) Modification - the word "only" is modifying the number "two", so the best phrase is "only two" (as opposed to "two only").
Eliminate C (if you haven't done so already) and E

3) Active Voice - "London" should be as early in the sentence as possible.
Eliminate D and E

4) Style - "In a London that afforded its playwrights" is a grammatically correct style phrase.

Final Answer: B

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"In a London", sounds so strange to the ears!

Rich, can you give some insight into how such phrases are correct?
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by [email protected] » Fri Sep 06, 2013 10:49 pm
Hi vinay1983,

The phrase "In a London..." is similar to the phrase "In a World..." (which sometimes appears in American Movie Trailers); it's not too common of a phrase, but it is stylistically correct.

The usage can be for hypothetical situations...

eg In a London that saw the Germans win World War II.....

The usage can also be for historical situations (as it's used here)....

eg In a London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters....

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by \'manpreet singh » Mon Sep 09, 2013 3:35 am
gauravhesoyam wrote:In London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters, Alpha Behn, by 1687, had 17 of her plays staged in as many years.

A) In London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters,

B) In a London that afforded its playwrights only two theaters,

C) Even though London's playwrights only afforded two theaters,

D) Only two theaters were afforded by London to its playwrights, and

E) Two theaters only were afforded by London for its playwrights, and


Please help me with this question.
D, E are wrong as usage of "and" does not make sense to the sentence

"In a London" is wrong....it should be "in london" , b knocked off

Confused with A and C.
But on second thought i will go with C, simply because according to the sentence only 2 playwrights were afforded in london, but strangely Alpha had 17. So it require the usage of "even though" to show the unexpected result.

Whats the OA?
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by sana.noor » Mon Sep 09, 2013 7:27 pm
"in a london" is right as "a" refers to a particular version of london "17th century"
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by \'manpreet singh » Tue Sep 10, 2013 9:00 am
"In a London" looks strange on first glance,but on second thought's i agree with you Sana.Thanks for pointing it out.

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