Agatha Christie's travels with her archaeologist husband inspired her to write several mystery novels; travelers to Egypt can still stay at the Old Cataract Hotel, the model for the hotel in one of Christie's most famous books.

A) Agatha Christie's travels with her archaeologist husband inspired her to write several mystery novels

B) Agatha Christie used her travels with her archaeologist husband to inspire several mystery novels

C) Because her husband was an archaeologist, Agatha Christie was able to use their travels as inspiration for several of her mystery novels

D) Together with her archaeologist husband, Agatha Christie was inspired to incorporate their travel into several of her mystery novels

E) Agatha Christie's travels with her archaeologist husband served as inspiration for several of her mystery novels

The original answer is E. Can someone explain to me the possessive pronoun rules regarding antecedents. Maybe I'm misinterpretting the Possessive Poison rule from the SC guide, but I thought since the subject was Agatha Christie's travels that "her" could not refer to Agatha Christie. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

for the most part, the "possessive poison" rule is more trouble than it's worth. in fact, although you can use it to eliminate a choice here and there, it has been the deciding factor in exactly 0 official problems to date. yes, that's right: zero, as in none. therefore, unless you understand the possessive poison role PERFECTLY, you're actually better off forgetting about it entirely.

in any case, the rule is:
you can't use a NON-possessive pronoun to stand for a possessive noun.
that's it.
note that ALL THREE other combinations -- possessive pronoun for possessive noun, non-possessive pronoun for non-possessive noun, and possessive pronoun for non-possessive noun -- are okay. ONLY the aforementioned combination is ruled out.

in choice (e), "her" is actually a possessive (check the context), and so is not subject to this rule.
the second instance of "her" in choice (a), however, is an OBJECT pronoun, and so is incorrect according to this rule. (the first instance of "her" is another possessive pronoun, and so is perfectly okay.)

Hi, In choice C and D is the pronoun Their wrong based on agreement? I know its simply wrong because it's not their novels but I was under the impression that in order for you to use their, we need a plural antecedent not an additive phrase, or a subordinate phrase?

Thanks

Steve

Yes, You are correct !
Additive phrases don't result in "compound" subjects.
In (C), "Because her husband was an archaeologist" and in (D),
"Together with her archaeologist husband" merely serve as modifiers and therefore shouldn't result in a plural subject.

Yep, you two are right! You need either a single plural antecedent or a compound subject, compound object, or some other compound phrase.

_________________
Stacey Koprince
Instructor
Director of Online Community
ManhattanGMAT

Can you please give some examples of compound objects or structures in which "their" is used?

So far I was thinking that in such additive phrases, we can use "their" but as usual Stacey and Manhattan forum rocks!

I have one more question:
I was able to get rid of B, C and D but was stuck between A and E. I excluded A because I thought, in A, "to write" is implying towards "travels" as subject. As per Manhattan SC, it's not correct. Can you please tell me if my reasoning to exclude A was correct? I doubt but I would like to learn more about the rule. Can someone please?

"I thought, in A, "to write" is implying towards "travels" as subject"

I'm not sure I follow that. Do you mean that travels, rather than husbands, are the sort of things that would inspire one to write? If so, that's the wrong way to determine the subject. Notice that the entire noun phrase that begins the sentence, "Agatha Christie's travels with her archaeologist husband," is made up of "travels" and its modifiers. "Agatha Christie's" can be the subject, because it's possessive. "her Archaelogist husband" can't be the subject, because it follows the preposition "with."

"Can you please give some examples of compound objects or structures in which "their" is used?"

Sure, and so can you. Think of two people that share possession of something, then use the word "and" to join those two names.

-We stopped by Steve's and Edie's house just before their bedtime.
-Perhaps Jon and Kate don't realize this is a poor way to raise their kids.

Hi Ron,

I know you'd rather have us forget the possessive poison role if we didn't understand it 'perfectly', but till I encountered this question, I thought I had a pretty good handle over this role. And now I can't keep myself from learning the additional rules that you've mentioned.

I think what makes this problem special is the use of the pronoun 'her'. I observed (on the MG SC guide) that 'her' is the only pronoun that can take both the 'object' case and the 'possessive' case. Are there any other examples that we should look out for?

As always, your inputs are greatly appreciated.

Regards,
Aritra

i think it's best to follow Ron's advice and just let possessive poison go. there are a lot better uses for your study time.. :)

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Tim Sanders
Manhattan GMAT Instructor

what is wrong with (b)?

why is e right and b wrong?

Since there's been discussion up above of why E is acceptable, let's talk about why B is wrong.

This is a bit tricky. B says that the travels inspired the novels. This meaning is incorrect; only *people* can be inspired. However, the travel CAN serve as an inspiration for the novels. Annoying, I know! :-)

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Jamie Nelson
ManhattanGMAT Instructor