Hi,

Tommy used this below example to illustrate tougher splits. Unfortunately I don't understand why he eliminated A,B,C because of a modifier issue.

from my point of view, i can only get rid of b because i'm aware of when to use "due to" vs "because of". a,b,c all seem to be initial subordinate clauses that are verb modifiers modifying "love".

The reason a,b,c are wrong is because "Tommy" should follow the initial subordinate clause. That reminds me of Ron's video on initial modifiers, but i'm certain that this modifier is purely a verb modifier according to the mgmat sc guide.

**edit, i initially thought these were subordinate clauses and I realize now that I am wrong. a,b,c all start with initial prepositional phrases. Even then, a,b,c seem to be adverbial prepositional phrases modifying "love".

a. Because of his undeniable appeal, all the women love tommy
b. Due to his amazing charisma, all the women love tommy
c. on account of his unbearable charm, all the women love tommy
d. Because no one can help loving the gmat, all the women love tommy
e. Though the gmat might not be all that exciting, all the women love tommy

Good question, and there is a great learning lesson here. The GMAT likes to often start off a sentence with a long descriptive phrase followed by a comma. Whenever I see this I immediately think modifier and must ensure that the word following the comma is correctly described by the phrase.

Let's look at these three phrases:
Because of his undeniable appeal, . . .
Due to his amazing charisma, . . .
On account of his unbearable charm, . . .

Who or what are all of these phrases describing? Is it really "love" that has undeniable appeal, amazing charisma, and unbearable charm? Or is it "Tommy"? :-) Because "Tommy" is being described by these phrases he must be the word following the comma.

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Jamie Nelson
ManhattanGMAT Instructor

Jamie,

thanks. I agree with what you wrote as it all makes sense. though I'd like to paste something I saw from Ron.

it should be noted that, if the initial modifier is a prepositional phrase, then this rule doesn't apply -- the prepositional phrase will modify the entire action that follows. for instance,
in 1994, i graduated from high school
is a perfectly valid sentence.


"the rule" is the same as what you mentioned. The subject of that modifier immediately following the initial modifier.

can you classify what these modifiers are? The last two look like prepositional phrases, and the first looks like a subordinator.

Because of
Due to
On account

It's fine if this ends up not having a hard rule. I know Ron's example "in 1994" is nothing like "because of his undeniable appeal". But for someone learning like me, I can only confidently say that they are both prepositional phrases so there is some confusion.

The difference is that "in 1994" doesn't have any internal words that require the phrase to refer to a specific person. In A,B,C above, the the word "his" in the opening phrase tells you to expect a human male to show up after the comma.. :)

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Tim Sanders
Manhattan GMAT Instructor

thanks again Tim, that was what i was looking for. I also suspected that to be the difference, but there was no mention of it in the guide on pronouns or modifiers.

glad to help!

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Tim Sanders
Manhattan GMAT Instructor