Known for her humorous but acerbic wit, the fashion doyenne commented, in her usual, simultaneously (i) _________ and (ii) _________ manner, that in Los Angeles, “the women dressed like men and the men dressed like boys.”
| Blank (i) slanderous amusing serious |
Blank (ii) considerate hysterical caustic |
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Solution
Amusing, caustic. The clue “usual” means that the two blanks must match “humorous but acerbic” — and in order.
Many ___________ people feared for the life of Ronald Reagan because since 1840, every president elected in a year ending in zero had died in office.
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Solution
Superstitious. The pivot word because indicates that the blank will agree with the (interesting but meaningless) pattern that every president elected in a year ending in zero had died in of ice. Don’t fall for traps like conservative (which would only be attractive if you were using outside information).
Napoleon is of course most famous for his military triumphs, but his innovative code of law had a subtler but more _____ impact, as its principles strongly influenced legal codes well into the 20th century.
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Solution
Enduring. The blank must agree with strongly influenced legal codes well into the 20th century; thus, the code of law is enduring. Note that incorrect choice fleeting is exactly the opposite of the intended meaning.
On an aptitude test in 1986, an argument posited that the possibility of conducting banking transactions from home was as likely as flying cars, an argument that today sounds ___________.
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Solution
Preposterous. The blank must agree with the clue that the possibility is remote. Note that prescient is the opposite of what you want — because the prediction about the future was entirely wrong, it did not sound prescient.
The fact that the average life expectancy ten thousand years ago was so much shorter than it is now is often (i) ________ as evidence supporting the notion that the world always improves with time. However, if you (ii) _________ for the fact that most children in that epoch died in childbirth, it turns out that life expectancy back then was nearly the same as it is now. On a (iii) _________ note, it also turns out that many “barbaric” hunter-gatherer tribes were taller on average than the average person now living.
| Blank (i) cited disregarded embodied |
Blank (ii) prepare read correct |
Blank (iii) contrastive sidereal tangential |
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Solution
Cited, correct, tangential.
You can start with the first blank here, where a fact about life expectancy relates to the world improving with time. Clearly this would be true if life expectancies have increased with time, so you can simply use cited in the first blank. The second blank, however, says that this statistic is slightly misleading if you consider a new fact (i.e., that most children died in childbirth). This means you need to correct for the new piece of information. The final sentence seems a bit off-topic (suddenly you’re talking about height, when you had been talking about life expectancy), so you should use the word tangential to set it off. Note that sidereal doesn’t have anything to do with being “on the side” — it means “related to the stars.”
In order to defend downloading music illegally, it’s necessary to engage in a bit of ethical (i) ___________. While it is true that traditional record labels (ii) _________ their artists—demanding indefensibly large percentages of their profits—downloading a song illegally is equally (iii) _________, because it robs both the label and the artist.
| Blank (i) contortion leniency probity |
Blank (ii) swindle disabuse deluge |
Blank (iii) justifiable unconscionable scrupulous |
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Solution
Contortion, swindle, unconscionable. It’s easiest to start this sentence with the second blank, where record labels are described as demanding indefensibly large percentages of [artists’] profits. This means the second blank should be swindle. The third blank then uses the word equally, implying that downloading a song illegally is also a kind of swindle. Both justifiable and scrupulous are positive words, so you need unconscionable, meaning “not right
or reasonable.” Now you can return to the first blank. You know that the prompt as a whole argues that downloading music is bad, so “in order to defend” it, one must be slightly dishonest. Probity and leniency are both good things. You want contortion, meaning “twisting or bending out of something’s normal shape.”
Although it was not the university’s policy to (i) _________ the authority of its faculty, the president felt that the professor’s comments regarding affirmative action could not remain (ii) _________.
| Blank (i) defend ruminate undermine |
Blank (ii) unavailed unchallenged averred |
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Solution
Undermine, unchallenged. The first word of the sentence tells you that the two parts of the sentence will oppose each other. The second suggests that the president felt that the professor’s comments couldn’t be allowed to stand as they were, so they could not go unchallenged. If the university challenges a faculty member, however, this tends to subvert or undermine the faculty member’s authority, which is what you need for the first blank. Note that, if you picked defend for the first blank, you would need a word like undefended in the second blank — none of the choices for the second blank match undefended.
Peculiarly enough, Shakespeare has been often (i) ______ as the best English language playwright, and often (ii) ______ as a man lacking the education to write those plays.
| Blank (i) crowned stigmatized castigated |
Blank (ii) demonized dismissed deified |
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Solution
Crowned, dismissed.
“Peculiarly enough” is the clue that indicates that the blanks oppose each other, and best English language playwright is the clue that tells you that the first blank must be positive, so the second blank must be negative. Crowned is the only positive word choice for the first blank. In the second blank, demonized is much too strong an attitude to direct towards someone for lacking education; dismissed is a more appropriate word.
The astrophysicist argues that our books and films about interstellar space travel are a form of mass _________, and that only a miracle on a scale heretofore unseen could allow a human being to voyage to even the closest star in another solar system.
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Solution
Delusion.
The second half of the sentence tells you that it would take a “miracle” for a person to get to another solar system. In other words, it’s more or less or impossible. Both dementia and hysteria are too negative and extreme. Delusion, meaning “a belief that is maintained despite being contradicted by reality,” is the best fit.
In Europe, football, otherwise known as soccer, it the most popular sport by several orders of magnitude, whereas in America, fandom is fairly evenly __________ among a few different sports.
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Solution
Apportioned.
You begin by learning about football, which is by far the most popular sport in Europe. The word whereas then creates a contrast, so you need American fans to be evenly split between their many sports. Measured is close, but
doesn’t quite divide things up the way you need it to. Apportioned means “divided and allocated.”