Q1 - Carver's stories are somber

[Nina]

Why is B incorrect?

Many thanks!

[a3friedm]

Hi Nina,
(B) is incorrect because there is actually no disagreement over whether or not his work is pessimistic, both Illana and Gustav characterized his work as such. I'd actually say you can go further with it and rule out B because of the "in his vision", because neither of them discuss his vision and you should be weary when an answer choice has new information. Since this is the first question in the section you probably don't need to get that picky.

In this stimulus we know that
Ilana says "Carver's stories are somber and pessimistic , which is a sure sign of inferior writing."

as opposed to Gustav: "Carver was one of the finest writers of the pasted 30 years. Granted, his stories are characterized by somberness and pessimism"

This leads us to answer choice (D). Ilana views somber and pessimistic writing as a sign for bad writing, where as Gustav thinks it is, indeed well written.

You can get rid of answer choice (A) because there is no mention or relationship to compassion in Ilanas passage. Same reasoning can be applied with (C) and humorous. (E) is pretty far out of scope, neither of the statements gave us anything about determining aesthetic value.

Hope that helped

[bbirdwell]

I agree. Both authors say the guy's writing is pessimistic. One says this means that his writing is bad, and the other says he was one of the best writers of the past 30 yrs.

Therefore, they disagree as to whether Carver's (pessimistic) writing can be good.

[cverdugo]

Disagree.

Illana: Her conclusion is that it's inferior writing, and characterizes them

Gustav: Doesn't necessarily dispute that characterization but still draws a different conclusion about the quality of writing.

Initial prediction was that they disagreed about the quality of writing.

D: Captures that but re-words in way that they both would have an opinion. Ilana would say NO and GUSTAV would say yes.