Pronoun reference.

Question

Christlers, the famous art house in London, owns several Hussains of various periods on account of having achieved an iconic status in the English art circle.

(A) on account of having
(B) on account of their having
(C) because they have
(D) because of having
(E) because it has

Dear Experts,

Need your opinion here. This Question has been discussed many times before in BTG but the poster has not posted the OA and the source. There is a lot of confusion among all the members between the options E and C. Please clarify.

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avik.ch · Answer

The only competitor is C and E.

The difference lies in "they" and "it".

According to meaning of the sentence,

Chryslers, the famous art house in London owns several Hussains of various periods.... why ??

Because Several Hussains achieved an iconic status.... so it should be "they" as "several hussains" is plural here --- IMO:C

GmatVerbal · Answer

Christlers is a the famous art house in London and also "owns" is used in the sentence implying that Christlers is a singular subject, So I go with E;

GMATGuruNY · Answer

shekhar.kataria wrote:Christlers, the famous art house in London, owns several Hussains of various periods on account of having achieved an iconic status in the English art circle.

(A) on account of having
(B) on account of their having
(C) because they have
(D) because of having
(E) because it has

Dear Experts,

Need your opinion here. This Question has been discussed many times before in BTG but the poster has not posted the OA and the source. There is a lot of confusion among all the members between the options E and C. Please clarify.

Here is the meaning conveyed by E:
Christlers has achieved an iconic status; for this reason, the art house owns several Hussains of various periods.
This meaning requires that a reader make a connection between the ICONIC STATUS of the art house and the owning of SEVERAL HUSSAINS OF VARIOUS PERIODS.
This connection can be made only if a reader has FOREKNOWLEDGE that owning several Hussains of various periods is a noteworthy feat.

The meaning conveyed by C makes more sense and require no such foreknowledge:
The Hussains have achieved an iconic status; for this reason, Christlers owns several of these paintings.

avik.ch · Answer

Hii Mitch Sir,

From meaning point of view I understand that C is correct.

But at the same time the pronoun case rule seems not to hold here ( which I think is a thumb rule) - a subject case pronoun will always refer to a noun in a subject case, and same for object case.

Here, "because they have/because it has" introduce a subordinate clause and hence the subject of this subordinate clause will refer to Christlers, which is singular. According to this rule, E is correct.

Can we break this rule ?

Please help !!

GMATGuruNY · Answer

avik.ch wrote:Hii Mitch Sir,

From meaning point of view I understand that C is correct.

But at the same time the pronoun case rule seems not to hold here ( which I think is a thumb rule) - a subject case pronoun will always refer to a noun in a subject case, and same for object case.

Here, "because they have/because it has" introduce a subordinate clause and hence the subject of this subordinate clause will refer to Christlers, which is singular. According to this rule, E is correct.

Can we break this rule ?

Please help !!

The antecedent of a subject pronoun can be a noun in the object case. Consider SC44 in the OG12:

The plot of The Bostonians centers on the rivalry that develops between Olive Chancellor, an active feminist, and Basil Ransom, her charming and cynical cousin, when THEY find themselves drawn to the same radiant young woman whose talent for public speaking has won her an ardent following.

In the OA, they (subject pronoun) refers to Oliver Chancellor and Basil Ransom, both objects of the preposition between.

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