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Confused--Experts Help!!

by shobhitk » Fri Aug 08, 2014 2:32 am
Travelling the back roads of Hungary, in 1905 Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology, and they were armed only with an Edison phonograph and insatiable curiosity.

(B) In 1905, Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly, travelling the back roads of Hungary, began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology, and they were only armed
(C) In 1905 Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology, travelling the back roads of Hungary armed only.
(D)Having traveled the back roads of Hungary, in 1905 Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology; they were only armed
(E) Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly, in 1905 began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology, traveling the back roads of Hungary, arming themselves only.

OA: C

I'm very confused betwen B and the OA....OA doesn't even seem to make sense. I see modifier errors in the OA. Please help.
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by GMATGuruNY » Sat Aug 09, 2014 9:54 am
C: In 1905 Beta Bartok and Zoltan Kodaly began their pioneering work in ethnomusicology, traveling the back roads of Hungary armed only with an Edison phonograph and insatiable curiosity

Generally, a COMMA + VERBing modifier serves to express an action that is CONTEMPORANEOUS WITH the preceding action.
Here, COMMA + traveling implies that Bela and Zoltan were already TRAVELING all over Hungary when they BEGAN their work.
But the intended meaning seems to be that Bela and Zoltan were traveling all over Hungary as they CONDUCTED their work, not when they began it.
Thus, the COMMA + VERBing modifier traveling does not convey the intended meaning.

SC26 in the OG12 contains a similar error:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/emily-dickin ... 21769.html

Another error in C:
The back-to-back modifiers -- traveling the back roads, armed only with an Edison phonograph -- need to be connected by a conjunction such as and.

Ignore the SC above.
It does not have a correct answer.
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