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AP English Language and Composition 2.7 Passage Drill 262 Views
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Description:
AP English Language and Composition 2.7 Passage Drill. The speaker's choice of syntax in the phrase, "he... guilt" (line 17) places most emphasis on which of the following words?
Transcript
- 00:00
[ musical flourish ]
- 00:03
And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by Parliament.
- 00:06
Sort of like our Congress, but where laws can actually get passed.
- 00:10
Yeah.
- 00:11
Check out the passage again.
Full Transcript
- 00:13
Yeah, again. How many times have you read this?
- 00:18
Keep reading, keep reading... This is awful.
- 00:21
[ mumbles ]
- 00:27
Okay, let's go.
- 00:28
The speaker's choice of syntax in the phrase,
- 00:31
"he... guilt" (line 17)
- 00:34
places most emphasis on which of the following words?
- 00:38
And here are the potential answers.
- 00:39
[ mumbles ] Hmm.
- 00:42
All right, well, let's go.
- 00:43
Okay, so this question wants us to zero in on a particular
- 00:46
line and figure out what is being emphasized most.
- 00:49
Unfortunately, none of the words are italicized, so there goes that shortcut.
- 00:53
Well, here's the line they're citing, plus the one before it for a little context at no extra charge.
- 00:58
"He conjured them to think of the blood that would be shed,
- 01:02
and to remember that it would lie at their door;
- 01:05
they retorted the charge;
- 01:07
he was the aggressor and his would be the guilt."
- 01:11
All right. Rather than taking these five choices one by one,
- 01:14
let's dissect this thing a bit and figure out what it's saying.
- 01:17
"He conjured them to think of the blood that would be shed, and to remember that it would lie at their door."
- 01:22
So the king's warning the Houses about all the blood
- 01:25
that'd be spilled and that it would be in their neighborhood.
- 01:28
Not a good thing.
- 01:29
But then "they retorted the charge;"
- 01:32
(that is they came back with)
- 01:34
"he was the aggressor and his would be the guilt."
- 01:37
I.E. it was the king who started it,
- 01:40
so whatever nasty stuff went down,
- 01:42
he was the one who'd have to live with it.
- 01:44
In other words, the Houses are trying to take the blame
- 01:46
off their shoulders and put it on the king's.
- 01:49
Well, with that in mind, it seems like "he" and "his"
- 01:52
are the two most likely candidates here.
- 01:55
However, we give "his" the nod here because
- 01:58
"he was the aggressor" is more of a statement of fact,
- 02:01
while "his would be the guilt" is more of an accusation.
- 02:05
And people tend to emphasize accusations a bit more than facts.
- 02:08
So our answer is C.
- 02:10
And if we're wrong, well, we're just blaming the king.
- 02:12
[ whining ] [ evil laughter ]
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