Historian: In rebuttal of my claim that West influenced Stuart, some people point out that West's work is mentioned ...
Claireon April 29, 2019
Question
Hey!
I put A as my answer. Why is D correct? Thanks!
1 Reply
Ravion April 30, 2019
@claire_crites,
Great question. Let's go over (A) and (D).
(A) says, "Stuart’s discussions with Abella were one of the means by which West influenced Stuart."
While it's true that the historian does cite Abella as evidence, we still do not know anything about the conversations that Abella and Stuart had with one another. For all we know, Abella could simply be how Stuart and West came to meet. We do not know whether the influence of West traveled through Abella. As a result, we can get rid of (A).
(D) says, "Stuart’s work was not entirely free from West’s influence."
In the stimulus, all of the historian's remarks after the "but" that starts the first sentence serve as evidence that West did, in fact, influence Stuart. (D) captures this, so this is the correct answer.
Does this make sense? Let us know if you have any other questions!