Let’s try a sentence completion question today. Your job is simply to choose the words that best complete the intended meaning of the sentence. Tip: Be sure to read the sentence carefully, and plug all the answer choices into the blanks before you make your final choice.
Undoubtedly highly educated and widely revered as ——- in his field, Professor Meursault was never ——- in his teaching; in fact, he showed great humility in dealing with his students and did not make a show of his erudition.
(A) an authority . . pedantic
(B) a boor . . haughty
(C) a satirist . . unassuming
(D) an iconoclast . . comprehensive
(E) an anachronism . . avant-garde
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The best answer is A. If you understand all the vocabulary words, this question should be relatively easy. The point here is that our Professor Meursault is a very educated and learned person, but he does not show off his knowledge. Answer choice (A) works well to express that meaning; the other answer choices do not.
A few tips–first, the word for the first blank must be a word with positive connotations because of the word “revered”–one wouldn’t be revered for bad qualities, at least not on the SAT. Second, the second blank needs to mean something that contrasts or is otherwise not directly related to the part of the sentence about Meursault’s showing “great humility in dealing with his students” and not making “a show of his erudition”. How do we know this? The phrase “in fact” is used to signal something surprising or unexpected. (Remember that!)
If you have any questions, please post them below in the comment section. I’ll try my very best to answer them. :)
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