Reading Comprehension · Humanities
PrepTest 121 · Section 3 · Passage 2
Questions 6–12
Before you start
Open PrepTest 121, Section 3 in your official copy from LSAC and read the passage for Questions 6–12, using the structure guide below. The passage is not reprinted here.
Structure guide
- P1: introduces a figure's view, embracing an established tradition as her own, and contrasts it with many peers who reject it
- P2: explains the reasons behind her view, built on early experience and the idea of shared, universal subjects
- P3: presents critics' objections and their alternative proposal
- P4: gives her reply: the alternative is just as limiting, differences show up best without trying, and every work still reflects its time
Step 2 · The kid passage
Owen and the Old Playbook
Owen is the only lefty pitcher on the school team, and he says he feels at home using the team's old playbook, even though righties wrote nearly all of it. Growing up, he loved reading those plays. Being a lefty never stopped him from enjoying them. This is his school's game, he says, so the playbook is his heirloom. Many lefty players in town toss the playbook aside as built for righties. Owen treats it with respect.
Owen also says that as a little kid he could feel the big moments of baseball, like nerves, teamwork and losing, before he ever played a real game. Those moments belong to every player, lefty or righty. When the play is about staying calm with the bases loaded, he says, which hand you throw with hardly matters.
Some coaches say this is too rosy. A lefty using a righty playbook, they argue, soaks up righty habits without noticing. And you cannot fix a righty playbook with righty plays. Lefties, they say, should invent a brand-new lefty style.
Owen answers that a lefty-only style is just as boxed-in as the old playbook. Whatever real lefty differences exist will show up in how he pitches, and they show up even more clearly when he is not trying to show them. He adds that big shared moments do not freeze the game in place. Every season's playbook shows its own time, in what it includes and what it leaves out.
Step 4 · The courtroom tale
The Case of the Grandmother's Recipe Book
A young baker, Ms. Tan, stood accused (in a pretend bake-off court) of being old-fashioned. The rival lawyer said, "Her family recipe book was written by people with old ideas. She can't escape those ideas using their recipes. She must invent a brand-new style!" Mr. Whitfield rose. "Your Honor, demanding a 'new-only' style is just as tight a box as the old book. Her own touch will show in every loaf, and it shows best when she isn't straining to prove it. And hunger, comfort, celebration? Every baker cooks for those." He paused. "Also, that old book already shows its era, in what it puts in and leaves out. Nothing is frozen." The judge smiled. "So the defense keeps the tradition, and expects her difference to rise on its own."