Practice Test 1 Verbal 1 Q6 Text Completion

[docjag]

Q6. Although never one to (i) ________ life's pleasures, only recently had Paul devoted himself entirely to (ii) ________ pursuits. In years past, Paul had adeptly balanced his love of fine wine and women with (iii) _______ career.

Blank(i) Blank(ii) Blank(iii)
O revel in O misanthropic O a feckless
O eschew O hedonistic O a nugatory
O peruse O nefarious O an exacting

I didn't understand the grammatical structure of the first sentence (Although .... pursuits). In the second sentence, does it mean that Paul adeptly balanced his love of ||fine wine and women who has an exacting career|| or ||fine wine and women|| with his exacting career??

It would be appreciated getting this answer as soon as possible. Moreover, I have purchased Manhattan Self paced Learning Module.

Thank you

Sohel

[tommywallach]

Hola!

To your second question, there is an idiom "balance X with Y," which is how you know what it means. I understand that technically you could try to balance fine wine and women, but that doesn't make any sense, because in the structure of the sentence, both fine wine and women would fall on the same side (hedonistic pursuits), so there's no balance there. A balance would be between something hedonistic (wine/women) and something anhedonic (work).

The first sentence also has an idiom "Never one..." This means that the person in question did NOT do the thing described afterwards:

"Never one to turn down a free drink..." means that the person in question never turned down a free drink.

In this case, the "although" sets up a contrast (that's what that word does, by definition). So even though we know this guy is NOT the kind of guy who has EVER totally ignored life's pleasures (eschewed), only recently has he decided to FULLY pursue life's pleasures (i.e. make that his entire focus). This is clarified later when we learn that he used to BALANCE work and wine/women. The implication is that now he's given up on focusing on work entirely.

Hope that helps!

-t

[docjag]

Hi Tom,

Thanks for such a great explanation! Your explanation is quite lucid and limpid. However, I would like to know more about such an idiomatic grammatical structures. Would you please inform me from where I should go for. Thank you.

Sohel

[tommywallach]

I have no idea what you just said. Please make every effort to write in full, clear, grammatically correct sentences on the forum. Thanks.

-t

[mohit.wrangler]

The Manhattan explanation for why "eschew" should fit in the first blank.

In describing Paul’s life, we know that he has always enjoyed “fine wine and women,” but in the past these interests were balanced with a career. Looking to blank (i), we know that Paul has always enjoyed “life’s pleasures” – meaning he has never “avoided” them, making “avoid” a good filler for blank (i).

Here is what I think: Since Paul, in his past life, adeptly balanced his love of fine wine and women with a demanding career, he had shown an abstemious character. The fact that he "balanced" implies that he did not heedlessly pursue a hedonistic lifestyle in the past. Considering this fact in mind, It would be appropriate to say that he was never one to "revel in" life's pleasures (in past) but now recently he has become hedonistic.

Let me know if you did not understand what I argued.
Please edify if my argument is faulty.

[tommywallach]

To argue that one who has balanced hedonism and non-hedonistic practices is "abstemious" would be incorrect. Abstemious is used for someone who doesn't indulge much at all. This guy sometimes indulged a lot and sometimes didn't. So he clearly DID revel in life's pleasures. I don't have to do NOTHING but enjoy life's pleasures to revel in them. Revel just means "to get great pleasure in something." You can revel in something while being quite controlled about it.

-t