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OG 13 Q38

by pranaygoyal02 » Mon Aug 27, 2012 9:22 pm

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Hi

If I say :

I had the best time when I had been with you,

Two events here :

Independent clause :I had the best time
Dependent clause :when I had been with you,


My question here is did it happen all at the same time. or is the event happening at different time.Also in the context please look at the OG 13 q38 :

Bengal - born writer, philosopher, and educator Rabindranath Tagore had the greatest admiration for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been skeptical of Gandhi's form of nationalism and his conservative opinions about India's cultural traditions


A. same
B. for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
C. for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
D. of Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as also a politician, but Tagore was
E. of Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore had also been

[spoiler]OA : B[/spoiler]

How is the answer justified.

Is "Bengal - born writer, philosopher, and educator Rabindranath Tagore had the greatest admiration for Mohandas K. Gandhi" not in past perfect tense since past participle has not been introduced here.


Please explain in detail.
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by EducationAisle » Mon Aug 27, 2012 10:06 pm

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No, it is "simple past" and not "past perfect".

I have a pen - Simple Present
I had a pen - Simple Past.
Ashish
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by vk_vinayak » Mon Aug 27, 2012 10:34 pm

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Bengal - born writer, philosopher, and educator Rabindranath Tagore had the greatest admiration for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also skeptical of Gandhi's form of nationalism and his conservative opinions about India's cultural traditions.

The whole sentence is in simple past.

Eg: I had a blue car -> Simple Past
I had had a blue car -> Past Perfect.

P.S: Please underline the part of the sentence. Using 'same' for option A without underlining doesn't make any sense.
- VK

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by e-GMAT » Tue Aug 28, 2012 12:01 pm

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Hi Pranay,

I had the best time when I had been with you.

Let's first correct the tense of the sentence to communicate the intended meaning.

I had the best time when I was with you.

Notice that "had" is the past tense of simple "have". Has/have/had only act as perfect tense when they are followed by another verb.

I have your book. Simple Present Tense.

I had your book. Simple Past Tense.

I have read your book. Present Perfect Tense.

I had read your book. Past Perfect Tense.

In the sentence mentioned by you, both the actions took place at the time. "I" had the best time when "I" was with "you". Both the actions took place together. Hence there is no need to write them in two different tenses.

Now let's analyze the official sentence:

Bengal - born writer, philosopher, and educator Rabindranath Tagore had the greatest admiration for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been skeptical of Gandhi's form of nationalism and his conservative opinions about India's cultural traditions


A. same
B. for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
C. for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
D. of Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as also a politician, but Tagore was
E. of Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore had also been

Apart from other errors, there is a verb tense error in Choice A. The first verb in the sentence "had" is a simple past tense. Tagore had the greatest admiration for Gandhi for certain reasons. However, he was skeptical of him too for some other reasons. Tagore had these contrasting feelings for Gandhi at the same time. Hence, they must be written in the same tense. We don't need sequencing here.

Choice B corrects this verb tense error by using simple past tense "was". Now both the tenses are in the same tense - simple past tense. This choice also corrects the other errors in the original choice.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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by [email protected] » Mon Mar 11, 2019 9:51 am

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Hello Everyone!

Let's take a closer look at this question to figure out how we should tackle it. First, here is the original question, with any major differences between the options highlighted in orange:

Bengal-born writer, philosopher, and educator Rabindranath Tagore had the greatest admiration for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been skeptical of Gandhi's form of nationalism and his conservative opinions about India's cultural traditions

(A) for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been
(B) for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
(C) for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
(D) of Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as also a politician, but Tagore was
(E) of Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore had also been

After a quick glance over the options, a few key differences jump out at us:

1. How they begin: admiration for vs. admiration of (idiomatic rules)
2. How to handle describing Gahdhi as a person and politician (possibly parallelism?)
3. How they end: had been vs. was (verb tense)

The quickest way to rule out wrong options is to find something on the list that will eliminate 2-3 options. For us, this means dealing with #1 on our list: admiration for vs. admiration of.

The rule in English is that people have admiration for other people - they do NOT have admiration of other people. So let's see which options do this correctly:

(A) for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been
(B) for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
(C) for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also
(D) of Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as also a politician, but Tagore was
(E) of Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore had also been

There you go - we can eliminate options D & E because they don't follow the proper idiomatic rule for "admiration for."

Now that we have 3 options left, let's move on to #2 on our list: how to describe Gandhi. When listing 2 or more items, such as the qualities of a person, we MUST use parallel format whenever possible. Let's take a closer look at options A, B, and C to determine if they use parallel wording or structure:

(A) for Mohandas K. Gandhi the person and also as a politician, but Tagore had been --> NOT PARALLEL
(B) for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also --> PARALLEL
(C) for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also --> PARALLEL

So, we can eliminate option A because it does not use parallel structure when describing both traits of Gandhi.

Now we're only left with 2 options. Let's take a closer look at both, and see if we can spot any other problems:

(B) for Mohandas K.Gandhi as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also

This option is CORRECT! It uses the proper idiom for "admiration for" a person, it uses parallel structure, and it doesn't have any other issues we can spot.

(C) for Mohandas K.Gandhi not only as a person and as a politician, but Tagore was also

This answer is INCORRECT because it doesn't use the proper format of the idiomatic structure "not only X, but also Y." Any time you see the phrase "not only" in a sentence, there MUST be a phrase that starts with "but also" with nothing in between the words! It's a tricky one to catch, yet it's a common idiom that pops up on the GMAT exam!

There you have it! Option B is our correct choice! By choosing to focus on simple differences between the options, we found the best option quickly!


Don't study for the GMAT. Train for it.
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