#19 - Concept Reference, Must Be True, Principle

[Administrator]

Please post your questions below! Thank you!

[RAB]

Dear PS expert,

How do you get to the right answer for this question?

RAB

[Rachael Wilkenfeld]

Hi RAB,

This is a must be true principle question, which requires us to find what description matches what we saw in the passages. I'd approach this problem in two steps. First, we need to know what the view of detective fiction was in passage (A). The key aspect in passage (A) is the interaction between the reader and the text. Borges in particular thought about the suspicions of the reader. We can use this information to eliminate answer choices (A), (B), and (E) which do not address the interaction between reader and text at all.

Moving into the second step is to look to the principle described in passage (B). Passage (B) states that we can differentiate genres in literature by how the reader interacts with the text. Great! This seems to go along with Borges views. We can combine these views by saying that detective fiction can be differentiated by the way in which the reader interacts with the text---suspiciously per Passage A.

Turning to our last two answer choices we see that answer choice (C) is a much better match for what we need than answer choice (D). Answer choice (D) describes a possible way the reader could interact, but it doesn't match what we learned from Passage A. Therefore, answer choice (C) is our best choice.

As an aside, we'll be able to provide more useful assistance the more information you can give us about what you were thinking. If you let us know what you were tempted by, or how you approached it, we can give guidance about your process and errors (if any).

[ashpine17]

How does D not match what we learned from passage A? C and D look the same to me

[Robert Carroll]

Ash,

Borges claimed that what is distinctive about detective fiction is that the reader of detective fiction confronts literature with incredulity and suspicions (lines 5-8). That's all we see about what specific elements go into a reader's approach to fiction that would make that approach count as reading detective fiction. There's no indication that detective fiction must involve unraveling a puzzle that the reader and protagonist unravel at the same time. So answer choice (D) is talking about elements we might expect detective fiction to have from our outside knowledge, but which are not mentioned in the passage. And the question is asking us to consider Borges's view only.

Robert Carroll

[rocketman16]

I thought of another way to look at C while I was doing my own review of this test in case anyone may find it useful: Passage B states that "we can differentiate genres in literature by how the reader interacts with the text" as Rachael said. This is exemplified where the author discusses reading protocols. In this same piece of the text though, there is a specific quote that stands out "The texts most central to a genre are those that were clearly written to exploit a particular protocol," (Line 34-35). Option C is a direct application of writing designed to exploit a certain protocol.