SAT Reading & Writing · Text Structure and Purpose
A classicist's essay on an ancient Greek tragedy begins by summarizing the play's central plot, then shifts to examining how surviving…
A classicist's essay on an ancient Greek tragedy begins by summarizing the play's central plot, then shifts to examining how surviving fragments of a lost commentary suggest ancient audiences may have interpreted a key scene very differently than modern readers typically do, instead of assuming the modern reading is simply what the original audience understood.
Which choice best describes the function of the phrase "instead of assuming the modern reading is simply what the original audience understood" in the text?
Which choice best describes the function of the phrase "instead of assuming the modern reading is simply what the original audience understood" in the text?
Answer and explanation
Answer: C: It signals that the essay is challenging a common but potentially mistaken assumption about historical interpretation.
The phrase directly identifies and sets aside a common assumption, that modern interpretation matches the original ancient one, in favor of the essay's evidence-based reconsideration. C captures that challenging function precisely. A misreads the phrase as an unrelated topic shift. B overstates the essay's claim into a sweeping, unsupported judgment about ancient audiences generally. D misdescribes the phrase as mere repetition of information already given.
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