Sentence Correction

gunjan1208 wrote:Hi,

it has to be only about "ing"

Avik is right is this. Can we have expert help here?

e-GMAT wrote:Hi Everyone,

Yes this rule applies only to verb-ing words. Extending this to verb-ed words is a very big mistake. And you know, when you are in such doubt, just take simplest of examples...

Mary cooks food. - cooks is the verb - simple present tense.
Mary is cooking food. - is cooking is the verb - present continuous tense
Mary cooked food. - cooked is the verb - simple past tense.

Now since these kind of simple sentences you use in your day to day spoken English, you know that these are correct. So from this you will know right away that cooked is very much a verb. You do not need a helping verb to make it a verb. Likewise, is cooking is a verb. See we need a helping verb here. In fact if we simply said "Mary cooking food", it would be incorrect.

@Vishal, I am not sure where you read that the verb-ing word rule is applicable to verb-ed words as well. Such extrapolations will end up hurting your fundamentals in the language.

I hope this helps.

Thanks,

Payal

vishal.pathak wrote: In the above post, option E states that

American writer Donald Barthelme is renowned for his formally inventive, epiphanic short stories, which, characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

In the above sentence, pronoun 'which' should stand for the nearest noun. The closest noun is stories.
So the 2nd clause of the above sentence can be written as
Stories characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

e-GMAT wrote:Your doubt stems from a gap in your understanding of verb-ed modifiers and verbs.

Lets first understand this from meaning perspective.
Stories characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

If "characterized" is indeed a verb of the subject "stories", then the action of characterized is performed by the stories. right?? But is this logical - do stories characterize? Or are the stories themselves characterized by sentences combining stilted...Lets take a simple example:

1: Tom colored the table with bright pink pastel colors. "colored" = verb
2: Tables colored with bright pink pastel colors. - "colored" = verb-ed modifier
3: Table is colored with bright pink pastel colors. - "is colored" = verb

Notice how "colored" is verb in sentence 1 since Tom actually is the one who does the action of "coloring". But in sentence 2, "colored" is not a verb. Table itself does not actually color. Table is indeed colored with bright pink pastel colors. So in sentence 3, "is colored" is the verb.

As you can see, verb-ed modifiers are derived from passive verbs. You basically remove the helping verb - is/are/be/was/were from the passive construction and you get a verb-ed modifier.

Stories are characterized by sentences combining stilted...- are characterized is verb in passive voice.
Stories characterized by sentences combining stilted... - characterized is verb-ed modifier
The author characterized each and very aspect of the plot in a very pictorial manner. - characterized is verb in active voice.

I hope this clarifies your doubt. As you can see, a verb can either act as verb-ed modifier or a verb. It depends on the context in which it is used. So when you are confused about whether the word acts as modifier or verb, you may ask the question - does the subject or noun actually perform that action or would this verb in passive voice make sense with the subject/noun.

Thanks,

Payal
[/u]

EducationAisle wrote:

vishal.pathak wrote: In the above post, option E states that

American writer Donald Barthelme is renowned for his formally inventive, epiphanic short stories, which, characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

In the above sentence, pronoun 'which' should stand for the nearest noun. The closest noun is stories.
So the 2nd clause of the above sentence can be written as
Stories characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

By the way, the portion between the commas (characterized by sentences combining stilted) is non-essential. So, we cannot rephrase it as:

Stories characterized by sentences combining stilted, academic language with playful non-sequiturs

Couple of additional things:

1. There is a comma after which while what you have rephrased does not have a comma between stories and characterized

2. Even if you were to rephrase it the way you have suggested, it is not a clause. Think about the following group of words:

(a) Indian team characterized by players combing talent and diligence.

(b) Players combing talent and diligence characterized the Indian team

As you would perhaps appreciate, (a) this is not a complete sentence, while (b) is. This would also hopefully help you appreciate that (a) does not have any main verb (and hence, by the way, (a) is not a clause at all; it is a phrase). (b) does have a main verb characterized and is a complete sentence (and hence, is a clause).

3. The way option E is framed, if you were to go down the path of substituting which with stories, the structure should be: Stories academic language with playful non-sequiturs. Let us take an example:

Indian team, which, despite being plagued by multiple injuries, won the match against a much stronger team.

In the above sentence, if we were to substitute which with Indian team, the clause in the second part of the sentence that you should be looking at, would be:

Indian team won the match against a much stronger team.

Since despite being plagued by multiple injuries is a non-essential, you should not attempt to form the clause in the second part of the sentence:

Indian team despite being plagued by multiple injuries.