<p>This question is from CB's online course practice test 9.</p>
<p>Passage 1
When I entered journalism school in the 1920s, I
found out that perennial and fundamental laws governing
the art of good writing had been discovered. Experts
had stubbornly and rigorously analyzed readers modest
capacity to dedicate their attention to the printed page
and had established once and for all, apparently with the
mathematical precision of astronomers, the order of
readers natural preferences. They found that effective
prose was composed of a limited number of very simple
and common words grouped in short, crisp sentences.
When designed rigorously, such prose could penetrate the
opaque barrier of millions of readers indifference, apathy,
inattention, and obtuseness.</p>
<p>Passage 2</p>
<pre><code> Beginning writers are often taught that effective prose
</code></pre>
<p>is crisp and concise and that most readers have no patience
with densely complex sentences and obscure vocabulary.
While clarity and succinctness are certainly worthy goals,
I sometimes worry that our assumption that the reading
public can comprehend only such writing might be selling
them short. Assuming that readers are merely able to digest
simple words, and that they have no interest in puzzling
through more challenging prose, turns that theory into a
self-fulfilling prophecy. Its our responsibility as writers
to offer the public something beyond workmanlike writing:
if we dont, readers will never appreciate writing as an art
rather than as a mechanical craft.</p>
<p>In comparison to Passage 2, the tone of Passage 1 is more
(A) earnest
(B) inspirational
(C) complacent
(D) defensive
(E) sarcastic </p>
<p>The correct answer was E. According to the explanation, Choice (E) is correct. Passage 1 mocks the "experts" and also its own subject (writing) by using long sentences and uncommon words to explain that good writing should do the opposite. The language is especially sarcastic when the author portrays the "experts'" treatment of writing as a science that has "perennial and fundamental laws" that can be calculated "apparently with the mathematical precision of astronomers." The tone of Passage 2 is concerned, not sarcastic. Passage 2 speaks of the responsibility of writers to raise the reading level of their audience.</p>
<p>Is this just me or does this problem seem overly difficult? Does the SAT really require you to pick up on such subtle things (imho) as recognizing that the author is "using long sentences and uncommon words to explain that good writing should do the opposite"?</p>
<p>Idk why, but for some reason, I thought it was significantly more difficult than other CR problems. :|. I didn’t get a sense of sarcasm at all while I was reading it.</p>
<p>None of the other choices make any sense. A couple phrases that should clue you in to the sarcasm (or at least irony) are: stubbornly and rigorously analyzed readers’ modest
capacity and apparently with the mathematical precision of astronomers, </p>
<p>The first passage’s wordiness should be the first thing that stands out when you read it.</p>
Then you didn’t understand the passage. The question isn’t hard; you just can’t answer it because you didn’t understand the passage. If you understand the passage fully before going to the questions you’ll see that the questions aren’t very difficult (of course for the vast majority of people this is easier said than done). This type of question is common on the SAT, as well as other types that require you to infer something about the passage(s) at hand.</p>
<p>Think about what the author of Passage 1 is saying or trying to say/imply as you read the passage. I’ll guide you through what the passage means from the start:
This right off the bat implies that good writing can be “discovered,” as if there were some magical formula to good writing. You should right off the bat disagree with this, or find it an outrageous statement.
Once again, these statements are, in a serious context, outrageous. The author is saying that back in the 1920’s experts had stubbornly concluded with MATHEMATICAL precision (meaning they made it seem like their conclusions were 100% true) that effective prose should use a “limited” (small) number of simple and concise structures and should on the other hand use mostly very complex prose expecting readers to dedicate their attention to the writing. This as a serious statement assumes that readers are attentive enough to want to read such difficult-to-comprehend writing.
This statement implies that millions of readers are indifferent and inattentive, contradicting the implication in the previous statement that they are attentive. This assumes that such rigorously designed writing and prose could actually penetrate readers’ inattention, which is obviously not true. The author is being sarcastic. He or she believes that the average reader does not have a large enough attention span to read such complex writing. The average reader prefers short and concise writing.</p>
<p>Crazybandit, where does it say that the author of passage 1 says “and should on the other hand use mostly very complex prose expecting readers to dedicate their attention to the writing”? </p>
<p>Also, you say that the statement
</p>
<p>is contradicted by the implication in the previous sentence that they are attentive… but when you have simple prose with a “small number of simple and concise structures”, the readers would be attentive. So if it was “designed rigorously”, or in other words the structures were made simple concise, the prose could “penetrate the opaque barrier of millions of readers’ indifference, apathy…” </p>
<p>I don’t see any contradiction there.</p>
<p>Overall, i only see the sarcasm mentioned about the precision of the astronomers thing. I don’t think the passage OVERALL was sarcastic. WHat am i missing?</p>
“Experts had stubbornly and rigorously analyzed readers’ modest capacity to dedicate their attention to the printed page[a] and had established once and for all, apparently with the mathematical precision of astronomers, the order of readers’ natural preferences.”
“They found that effective prose was composed of a limited** number of very simple and common words grouped in short, crisp sentences.”</p>
<p>a) The first bold phrase implies that readers have a capacity to be attentive in their reading. I’m not sure what it means when the author calls this capacity “modest,” but it still implies that they have some capacity to dedicate attention to reading.</p>
<p>b) The second bold phrase tells us that effective prose contains a limited (SMALL) number of very simple and common words. This means that the rest (which is obviously a LARGE proportion of the writing) is complex and not as simple.</p>
<p>c) These two statements combined means that the experts believe writers should write rigorously (with a lot of hard words and very little easy words) and expect the readers to want to read it. So, the statement
says that the readers DON’T want to read it (they are indifferent). So, the previous implication is contradicted.</p>
<p>
Think about it. If it has a small number of simple words then obviously it has a large number of difficult words. “Designed rigorously” means designed in a complex, and hard-to-read way, not in a “simple” way. This type of writing cannot “penetrate the opaque barrier of millions of readers’ indifference…” But the author says it can. That’s being sarcastic. The whole passage is delivered in a way that makes it seem like the statements are serious or plausible, except they’re not plausible at all. They all build up to the last statement. Once the author delivers the last statement of the passage, the reader is supposed to think it’s so outrageous that it can’t be true: most readers want to read concise writing, not rigorous writing with only a LIMITED amount of simple words! Hence, sarcasm is a good way for the author of Passage 1 to deliver his or her point.</p>
<p>Even if you didn’t really comprehend the sarcasm in the passage, you should think that someone is being sarcastic whenever he or she says something that has a really bad argument. Obviously nobody can be mathematically figure out how to write well. Nobody can expect millions of indifferent readers to want to read rigorous and complex prose. Nobody reasonable thinks that effective prose is composed of only a few concise words. It’s all sarcastic, and it should be obvious to an understanding reader.</p>