Modifier help!

[RP]

In the simple plays, such as You Are Good, and the lyrical meditation of John Smith, Robert achieves an interplay between nature and the imagination that explores both the external world of sensory experience and the internal workings of the mind in contemplation.

What does the underlined portion modifies? I am confused on whether it modifies "imagination" or "interplay."

Discrimination in wages that blah blah.....

Can the modifier "that blah blah..." modify "Discrimination" or it has to modify wages?

In another words if you have "Noun1 + preposition + Noun2 + that modifier," can the modifier modify the first noun? Or is it that it always modifies the second noun?

Thank you for your help.

[jp.jprasanna]

In the simple plays, such as You Are Good, and the lyrical meditation of John Smith, Robert achieves an interplay between nature and the imagination that explores both the external world of sensory experience and the internal workings of the mind in contemplation.

What does the underlined portion modifies? I am confused on whether it modifies "imagination" or "interplay."

Discrimination in wages that blah blah.....

Can the modifier "that blah blah..." modify "Discrimination" or it has to modify wages?

In another words if you have "Noun1 + preposition + Noun2 + that modifier," can the modifier modify the first noun? Or is it that it always modifies the second noun?

Thank you for your help.

Dude I just read abt this 2 mins back.

gmatprep-rice-t2208.html

The above post will answer your question.

In shot -

Jake and Teena, who ARE

here WHO refers to both Jake and Teena because of the word "ARE"

Jake and Tenna, who is

here Who refers to TENNA because of the verb IS

So in your example.

In the simple plays, such as You Are Good, and the lyrical meditation of John Smith, Robert achieves an interplay between nature and the imagination that explores both the external world of sensory experience and the internal workings of the mind in contemplation.

"THAT exploreS" is singular hence "that" here refers to imagination ONLY.

HTH

Open to suggestions and corrections.

Cheers

[RP]

Why not "an interplay"? "an interplay" is singular also. Q is not defining subject because the verb is singluar or plural, it is about defining what subject the "that" should refer to. If that + verb is not in underlined portion, than you know where to go. But what if both subject (s) and the verb both are in underlined portion, then you can not say because the verb is "is" so it points to such and such. In those questions, I am sure there will choices with both singular and plural verb choices.

Thanks,
Raj

[krishnan.anju1987]

In the simple plays, such as You Are Good, and the lyrical meditation of John Smith, Robert achieves an interplay between nature and the imagination that explores both the external world of sensory experience and the internal workings of the mind in contemplation.

Here, the imagination is the word being modified. Otherwise, the sentence would have read, nature and imagination. The "the" here is to focus on 'that' that modifies imagination. If I remember right, GMAT tries to maintain parallelism in sentence construction.

Please comment if you find something wrong with my line of thought.

[RonPurewal]

In the simple plays, such as You Are Good, and the lyrical meditation of John Smith, Robert achieves an interplay between nature and the imagination that explores both the external world of sensory experience and the internal workings of the mind in contemplation.

Here, the imagination is the word being modified. Otherwise, the sentence would have read, nature and imagination. The "the" here is to focus on 'that' that modifies imagination. If I remember right, GMAT tries to maintain parallelism in sentence construction.

Please comment if you find something wrong with my line of thought.

the use of "articles" (a, an, the) is highly idiomatic and nuanced -- and, more importantly, not tested at all on the gmat. (it's not tested because it simply wouldn't be fair to test it; it's almost impossible for non-native speakers to fully grasp the nuances of articles.)
what's important to know, though, is that the use of a/an/the is not a parallelism issue.

[RP]

Ron,

I am still not clear on what "that clause" that I mentioned refers to. Would you please shed some lights on it?

[tim]

we'll need you to post the source for this one and, if it's a legal source, the entire question as well before we can discuss this one further..