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Difficulty: HardSubject-Verb Agreement (Concord)

Complete the sentence below by supplying the grammatically correct verb forms in the blanks.

Answer:Many a literary critic 【has】 argued that neither the author's intricate plots nor his evocative prose 【is】 sufficient to save the poorly structured novel.

Answer

The first blank requires 'has' and the second blank requires 'is' (or 'was').
The expression 'many a' requires a singular verb ('has'). In the subordinate clause, proximity concord dictates that the verb following 'neither... nor' agrees with the nearest subject noun phrase ('his evocative prose', which is singular/uncountable), requiring 'is' or 'was'.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Analyze the subject structure governing the first blank.
The noun phrase 'Many a literary critic' specifies a singular grammatical agreement.
In standard English grammatical concord, the fixed expression 'many a' followed by a singular countable noun requires a singular verb form ('has').
2
Analyze the correlative conjunction structure governing the second blank.
The subject uses 'neither... nor' to connect 'intricate plots' (plural) and 'evocative prose' (uncountable/singular).
By the principle of proximity concord, when subjects are joined by correlative conjunctions like 'neither... nor', the verb must agree with the subject element nearest to it ('evocative prose'), requiring a singular verb form ('is' or 'was').

Key Concept

Subject-Verb Agreement (Concord) involving 'many a' and correlative proximity rules
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Subject-Verb Agreement (Concord)

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