Q) (Manet’s work had a profound impact on his contemporaries), including famous Impressionists such as Monet and Renoir.
A - the same
B - Manet’s word had profoundly impacted his contemporaries
the answer is A, why not B?
Q) identify the error
(To understand fully) -A William Shakespeare’s body of work we must analyze (not only) -B his famous plays such as Hamlet, (but also) -C his (lesser known) - D plays poem, and sonnets. No error - E
the answer is E, yeah no error, why isnt D the answer, what is the difference between less and lesser?
For the first question, the subject is Manet’s work, and choice B makes the sentence awkwardly structured:
Manet’s work had profoundly impacted his contemporaries, including famous Impressionists such as Monet and Renoir.
In that sentence, the “including” and “such as” would become unnecessary, leading to additional changes. Leaving the sentence the way it was results in the least amount of change with a good amount of flow in the sentence structure, which is what you should focus on in these types of questions that are looking for the option that “makes the most sense”.
For the second question, it’s a small difference:
Less means that something is simply small in quantity, and lesser means that something is simply small in quantity in comparison to something else.
The detail is that it mentions “his famous plays such as Hamlet”, which quantifies how known his works are, which shows that lesser is better to use because of the aforementioned comparison. In these kinds of questions, I honestly don’t go that far in depth, it’s usually just what sounds awkward or looks like a grammatical error.
Because there’s no simple past tense in the sentence, there can be no “superpast.” There’s just one event, but to have superpast, you need two past events, one preceding the other.
The principle on the test is that you can only use the superpast (“had + pp”) for events that occurred before another past event, which must be in simple past.
So this is fine:
When I met Frank, he had already greased up the chihuahuas.
(event A–meeting Frank–is simple past, event B–greasing up the chihuahuas–is superpast b/c it occurred before event A)
But this isn’t:
When I had met Frank, he told me he had a bucket of chihuahua grease.
(both events occurred at the same time and thus must share the simple past)
Neither is this:
I had learned about the music of Ornette Coleman, the celebrated alto saxophonist and bandleader, in my graduate seminar on the principles of free jazz.
(there’s only one event, so it cannot be superpast)
@marvin100 - thanks a ton - wow, i really didnt know that for past perfect, you need both had and a past participle, i
ok , so only had by itself doesnt act as past perfect but simple past itself. thanks a lot again , really appreciate it
