In Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek—where, early on, the author marvels at a single goldfish's delicate fins but later winces when imagining a horde of goldfish laying and eating their own eggs—Dillard struggles to reconcile the complicated juxtapositions of the natural world. ______ nature's mesmerizing intricacy and pitiless harshness prove inextricably linked for Dillard, like "two branches of the same creek."
Which choice completes the text with the most logical transition?
Explanation
Context: The text describes Annie Dillard struggling to reconcile nature's beauty, a goldfish's delicate fins, with its brutality, goldfish eating their own eggs. The blank introduces the view she arrives at: intricacy and harshness are inextricably linked, like "two branches of the same creek."
Answer: A) Ultimately,
Why? The last sentence is the resolution of the struggle just described, the position Dillard reaches after wrestling with those juxtapositions, and "Ultimately," marks that end point.
Traps:
- B) "To that end," frames what follows as a means toward a goal, but the linkage is a conclusion, not a step taken to achieve something.
- C) "Hence," makes the linkage a consequence of her struggling, reversing the relation, since the linkage is what she struggles with.
- D) "Moreover," adds a further parallel point, while this sentence closes the thought rather than extending it.