Q21

[ohthatpatrick]

For Main Point questions, we should ask ourselves, "what was the scale" / "what was the most valuable sentence?" / what was the author's purpose?"

There's definitely a scale in this passage between Modernist architecture and its detractors (with the author falling on the latter side). The purpose overall seems to be to tell the story of the rise and fall of the Modernist movement.

Since the author is seeking to explain why the Modernist movement ultimately failed, the most valuable sentence might be the 1st sentence of the 3rd paragraph. However, the last paragraph also looks like a good synopsis of the whole.

a) Looks pretty good. "overly ideological" addresses the 2nd paragraph as well as the "primarily aesthetic" concerns addressed in the 3rd paragraph. "did not take into account the facts of building construction" addresses the 3rd paragraph nicely.

b) This claim is way too narrow to be a Main Point (and doesn't deal with Modernism's demise, which is the real topic of the passage). Also, it's unsupported. "functional spirit" was perhaps the closest we got to a "theoretical basis" and "functional spirit" does not mean the same thing as "rationality".

c) This answer seems to paint an overall positive picture of MM's contribution to architecture. Knowing that the author had overall negative impressions of Modernism should make us highly doubt this answer.

d) This answer sounds like paragraph 1, but not like any of the other 3 paragraphs. Knowing that the author is trying to tell the story of MM's demise, we should doubt this answer that only speaks of MM's beginnings.

e) True, but WAY too narrow. Again, this passage overall was about the rise and fall of MM.

(A) is the correct answer.