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Any literary translation is a compromise between two goals that cannot be entirely reconciled: faithfulness to the meaning of the text and faithfulness to the original author's style. █████ ████ ███ ████ ████████ ███████████ ████ ██ ██ ████ █ ██████ █████████████ ██ ███ ████████ █████
Objective: Pseudo Sufficient Assumption / Find The Rule Questions
A common misconception on the LSAT is that “principle questions” are a thing. In fact, the word “principle” appears in multiple question types which you should treat very differently. The most important thing to look for when you see the word “principle” is whether the principle points up or down. Some questions (PSAa or Rule Application questions) give us a principle in the stimulus and ask us to apply it down to the answer choices. These are akin to Most Strongly Supported questions, where we must be cautious of overstrong language and stick only to inferences supported by the stimulus.
This question (a PSAr or Find The Rule question) does the opposite: it presents a bunch of principles in the answer choices and asks us to apply them up to the stimulus in an effort to justify the argument. These are akin to Strengthen questions, where overstrong language is completely fine and we’re hoping to bridge any gaps in the argument we can find.
PSAr questions tend to follow routine patterns, and our approach can therefore be similarly routine. First, it’s critical to identify the argument’s conclusion and the premise(s) that seek to support it. In a shockingly high proportion of PSAr questions, the correct answer will take the form: Premise → Conclusion.
Like in normal Strengthen questions, though, it’s also important to note any common flaws you see, or (especially) subtle jumps from one concept to another (e.g. from talking about athletes to talking about professional athletes). Correct answers that address weaknesses like these are common as well.
Argument Summary And Rule Anticipation
This argument is two sentences long, and involves only two claims, a premise and a conclusion, which makes our goal quite simple. The principle we need will fit the Premise → Conclusion template – it’ll say “When you’re in a situation like [the one described in the premise], [the claim in the conclusion] has got to be true.” Anticipating the exact principle means guessing which pieces of the premise and conclusion they’ll pick out as the most relevant ones to connect.
Premise: All literary translations involve compromise between meaning and style.
Conclusion: Even the best translations will be flawed.
There are many ways to bridge the gap between the premise and conclusion, but the key to guessing the one most likely to show up in the right answer is to spot the subtle introduction of the novel concept “flawed.” We can anticipate something along the lines of:
If a translation is compromised, then it is flawed; or Compromise stuff is flawed stuff.
19.
Which one of the following ███████████ ██ ██████ ████ █████ ██ ███████ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ████████ ██████
a
A translation of █ ████████ ████ ██████ ██ ████████ ████████ ██ ███████ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ████████ ██████
b
If a literary ███████████ ██ ██████ ██ ██ █████████████ ██ ███ ████████ █████ ██ ██████ ██ ████████ ██ █ ██████████ ██████████ ███████ ████████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████████████ ██ ███ ████████ ████████ ██████
c
The most skillful ████████ ███████████ ██ █ ████ ████ ███ ███████████ ██ ███ ████ ████████ ██████████ ███████ ████████████ ██ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ████████████ ██ ███ ████████ ████████ ██████
d
Any translation that ██ ███ ████████ ████████ ██ ████ ███ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ████████ █████ ████ ██ ██ ████ █ ██████ █████████████ ██ ████ █████
e
Not even the ████ ████████ ████████ ███████████ █████ ██ ████████ ██ ████ ███ ███████ ███████ ██ ███ ████ ███ ███ ████████ ████████ ██████