2 Big Book Questions

GRE Verbal Problem Solving
1

Q.1. Many Americans believe that individual initiative
epitomized the 1890’s and see the entrepreneur as
the ------- of that age.
(A) caricature (B) salvation (C) throwback
(D) aberration (E) personification

I see why personification could be the right answer, but why would caricature be wrong here? I am not able to eliminate it.

Q.2. Neither the ideas of philosophers nor the practices
of ordinary people can, by themselves, ------- reality;
what in fact changes reality and kindles revolution is
the ------- of the two.
(A) constitute … divergence (B) affect. .aim
(C) transform . . interplay (D) preserve … conJunctIOn
(E) alter. .intervention

I actually was confused between (C) & (E) but I ended up choosing E, because I thought there is no proof of a transformation & also intervention just seemed like a better choice, I do agree the latter is not a very good explanation.

2

Why would it be right? What does “caricature” mean?

How come? Does “intervention” imply they are not by themselves, or is it interplay?

3

Doesn’t caricature mean picture or description of something?
So the entrepreneur could be seen as the caricature of the 1890s.

4

the query is related to “transform” over “alter”

5

Both are okay, Blank 1 is not the issue, it’s blank 2, since they both convey the idea of “changing reality”

It’s more about whether “caricature” or “personification” for blank 2

6

Q1:

Cariacture → bobble head sort of figure you have, not really fitting
Salvating → rescue from evil, noooo?
throwback → could be but using usage strat here, “throwback of that age”? throwback, if used to convey atavism, is used in a very different manner - for me, this just didn’t fit right on tongue
aberration → means weird, not apt
personification → symbolises (Correct)

Q2. Blank #1 guess: change reality, Blank #2: interplay

I see you already nailed it down to Cand E which is great.

Intervention means to intervene or interrupt. Interplay is a more germane word when used to signify the harmony between two different concepts working together to achieve something.