Their Eyes Watching God

Answer choices

1. A

   Out of Scope: long-term reputation6% picked this

   The long-term reputation of a work of art is less dependent on the response of literary critics than on the

   The author never generalizes about long-term reputations of art. In terms of Their Eyes, we could say that over the long term it went from having a reputation of "not important / relegated to the margins" to having a reputation of "very important and influential". But our Support Sentence is telling us that this transformation was very dependent on literary critics. It was their creation of new types of literary criticism that changed readers' expectations and enabled them to appreciate Their Eyes. So, if anything, we have support for the opposite of this answer.

   6%
2. B

   Too Strong: usually9% picked this

   Experimental works of fiction are usually poorly received and misunderstood by literary critics when they

   This has nothing to do with our Support Window, and we have no means in the passage of justifying a broad generalization that more than 50% of experimental fiction is poorly received and misunderstood at first.

   9%
3. C

   Correct82% picked this

   The response of literary critics to a work of art can be determined by certain ideological perspectives and assumptions

   Why this is right

   This answer surprisingly strays from the Support Window that locks in with the question stem's keywords, but it is appealing because of its weak language: "The response can be determined by X". That's not saying it's always determined by X, just that it can be at least sometimes. The author's discussion in the 2nd paragraph of why critics initially didn't celebrate Their Eyes as a great work supports this answer. He tells us that the response of critics (their negative criticism) was partially a result of (determined by) Hurston's ideological differences (her ideological perspectives and assumptions) with other members of the Black literary community. Their assumption about the purpose of Black art, at the time, was that it should "create protest fiction that explored the negative effects of racism in the US". Meanwhile, Their Eyes was not focused on doing that. And because the Black literary community had this perspective/assumption about the purpose of art (among black artists), it determined their less-than-embracing response to Their Eyes.

   Skill tested: Author Opinion · how this choice captures the passage's function is the move to repeat next time.

   82%
4. D

   Contradicted1% picked this

   Literary critics do not significantly affect the way most people interpret

   Our Support Window contradicts this, because the emergence of new types of literary criticism changed readers' expectations and enabled them to appreciate Hurston. [the emergence of feminist literary criticism and the development of standards of evaluation specific to the work of Black writers] changed readers' expectations of art and enabled them to appreciate Hurston's novel.

   1%
5. E

   Too Strong: first / most2% picked this

   The ideological bases of a work of art are the first consideration of

   While there's evidence in the passage that literary critics sometimes consider the ideological basis of a work, we can't support the extreme claim that more than 50% of critics begin evaluating a work by considering the ideological basis of the work.

   2%