OG 12 SC-003 A选项的夹心结构，看了几十张贴，没有找到这个问题。。。 - ChaseDream

Although various eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American poets had professed an interest in Native American poetry and had pretended to imitate Native American forms in their own works, until almost 1900, scholars and critics did not begin seriously to study traditional Native American poetry in native languages.

(A) until almost 1900, scholars and critics did not begin seriously to study
(B) until almost 1900 scholars and critics had not begun seriously studying
(C) not until almost 1900 were scholars and critics to begin seriously to study
(D) it was not almost until 1900 when scholars and critics began to seriously study
(E) it was not until almost 1900 that scholars and critics seriously began studying

问题1：插入语和grammatical fragments如何区分呢？我第一眼看到A选项，排除的理由竟然是fragments...
问题2：OG上说A选项中的“until almost 1900” 既可以修饰although从句中的动作，又可以修饰后面主句中的动作，从而造成修饰的ambiguous。一方面，我觉得前一句中的主语是eighteenth and nineteenth-century American poets, 从语义上来讲，until almost 1900 不太可能去修饰17,18世纪的人。另一方面，像“until almost 1900”这种结构一般都是放在句首修饰主句，不太可能单独地放在句尾修饰前面的动作，所以就不会出现修饰的ambiguous问题。

1.fragment指的是句子不完整，缺少主语或者谓语或者宾语，其中少谓语的比较多见（一般都是在有连词比如 and，but这种的前后出现碎句）
而插入语，一般作为定语或者状语，比如这题里面的until almost 1900作为状语存在
2.这里说until almost 1900会被误认为去修饰eighteenth and nineteenth-century American poets是从语法的角度来说，一般语法一定错的话，逻辑判错好像不会判到这么深的地步。。此外如果是19世纪的人，也有可能是1899年，那么1899年也可以认为是在接近1900年的时候。

until+时间的结构放在句子的首尾都很常见，没有特殊偏好。

个人愚见，仅供参考。

-- by 会员 anniecomet (2011/3/12 20:40:06)

我没有发现OG原文解释里面有提到fragment啊.

一般而言, 有个短语在前后两个分句中间, 总是有问题的. 不知道是修饰前面还是修饰后面, 就算能够从逻辑上看出来, 也逃不掉一个GMAC给盖的confusing的大帽子.

-- by 会员 FactOrFiction (2011/3/15 23:07:03)