A 3 min read

Rivaling the pyramids of Egypt or even the ancient cities of the Maya as an achievement, the army of terra-cotta warriors created to protect Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor, in his afterlife is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them.

A. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them

B. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it

C. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete

D. 700,000 artisans took more than 36 years to complete

E. to complete them took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years

 

What does this question test?

This question tests your understanding of parallelism and use of pronouns.

What does this sentence mean?

This sentence states two main facts about the construction of the army of terra-cotta warriors.  It also describes the army of terra-cotta warriors.

What are the errors in the original sentence?

Rivaling the pyramids of Egypt or even the ancient cities of the Maya as an achievement, the army of terra-cotta warriors created to protect Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor, in his afterlife

• is more than 2,000 years old and
• took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them.

This sentence has one clause as shown.  The sentence begins with a modifier “rivaling the pyramids…”.  This modifier modifies the subject “army of terra-cotta warriors”.  The subject is then followed by another modifier “created to protect…”.  This subject has two verbs in parallel construction as shown.  These two verbs indicate two facts about the “army of terra-cotta warriors”.

In this sentence, the use of pronoun “them” is unnecessary.  Furthermore, it does not agree in number with its antecedent.  “Them” refers to the subject of the sentence – “the army”.  Since “army” is a collective noun, it is singular and hence the pronoun referring to it should also be singular. Furthermore, the use is redundant as explained below.  Lets consider the sentence with only verb 2 and with the pronoun replaced by the noun it refers to:

The army of terra-cotta warriors took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete the army of terra-cotta warriors.

As you can see the noun – army of terra-cotta warriors is unnecessarily repeated.  Lets consider a simpler sentence to understand this better.

1. The dinner took Mary 2 hours to cook the dinner. – Incorrect
2. The dinner took Mary 2 hours to cook.  –Correct
3. It took Mary 2 hours to cook the dinner.  – Correct

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Answer Choice Analysis

Choice A: Pronoun redundancy error – them

Choice B:  Pronoun redundancy error as in Choice A.

Choice C:  No Errors

Choice D:  Punctuation Error:  The structure of this sentence is such that the subject for verb 2 in the original sentence is no longer “the army of terra-cotta warriors”.  The subject is “700,000 artisans”.  Hence this sentence now has two independent clauses but these are not connected using comma + and.  These are connecting using only “and”.  This is incorrect.

Choice E:  Pronoun error as in Choice A.  This choice is similar to choice A.  The placement of verb modifier “to complete them” has been changed.

Thus, Choice C is the correct answer.

What are the key take-away messages?

1. Correct sentence should not have any redundant expressions.
2. Only ‘and’ cannot be used to connect two independent clauses.

Where can you find more information?

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