Question:
Read the two sentences and choose the correct option:
1. Can you imagine his forgetting his own birthday?
2. Can you imagine him forgetting his own birthday?
Read the two sentences and choose the correct option:
1. Can you imagine his forgetting his own birthday?
2. Can you imagine him forgetting his own birthday?
1. Can you imagine his forgetting his own birthday?
2. Can you imagine him forgetting his own birthday?
Show Hint
Check whether the same person's possessive form gets used twice in one sentence.
Updated On: Jul 14, 2026
- The first sentence is correct
- The second sentence is correct
- Both sentences are correct
- Both sentences are wrong
Show Solution
Verified By Collegedunia
The Correct Option is B
Solution and Explanation
Step 1: Look at the verb form after "imagine".
The verb "imagine" takes an object followed by a gerund, the -ing form, when we talk about someone doing an action. That object can be a plain pronoun like "him" or a possessive pronoun like "his", but the choice changes what gets stressed in the sentence.
Step 2: Check sentence 1.
Sentence 1 says "imagine his forgetting his own birthday". Here "his forgetting" uses a possessive before the gerund, and then the sentence repeats "his own birthday" right after. Using "his" twice in a row like this reads awkward and stacks two possessives on the same person without need.
Step 3: Check sentence 2.
Sentence 2 says "imagine him forgetting his own birthday". Here "him" is the object of "imagine" and "forgetting his own birthday" describes what he does. This is the natural pattern used in everyday English when the focus is on the action, not on ownership.
Step 4: Eliminate the wrong choices.
Option A calls sentence 1 correct, but the double possessive there feels forced, so A is wrong. Option C says both are correct, but sentence 1 is not standard, so C is wrong. Option D says both are wrong, but sentence 2 is a normal, well formed sentence, so D is wrong.
Final Answer:
Sentence 2 is the naturally correct one. \[ \boxed{\text{Option B: The second sentence is correct}} \]
The verb "imagine" takes an object followed by a gerund, the -ing form, when we talk about someone doing an action. That object can be a plain pronoun like "him" or a possessive pronoun like "his", but the choice changes what gets stressed in the sentence.
Step 2: Check sentence 1.
Sentence 1 says "imagine his forgetting his own birthday". Here "his forgetting" uses a possessive before the gerund, and then the sentence repeats "his own birthday" right after. Using "his" twice in a row like this reads awkward and stacks two possessives on the same person without need.
Step 3: Check sentence 2.
Sentence 2 says "imagine him forgetting his own birthday". Here "him" is the object of "imagine" and "forgetting his own birthday" describes what he does. This is the natural pattern used in everyday English when the focus is on the action, not on ownership.
Step 4: Eliminate the wrong choices.
Option A calls sentence 1 correct, but the double possessive there feels forced, so A is wrong. Option C says both are correct, but sentence 1 is not standard, so C is wrong. Option D says both are wrong, but sentence 2 is a normal, well formed sentence, so D is wrong.
Final Answer:
Sentence 2 is the naturally correct one. \[ \boxed{\text{Option B: The second sentence is correct}} \]
Was this answer helpful?
0
0
Top SNAP English Questions
- A group of words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings; e.g. left (opposite of right) and left (past tense of leave)
- Read the passage and then determine the best choice for an answer from the questions given below. Base your choice on what this passage states directly or implies, not on any information you may have got from else where.
"The emancipation of women", James Joyce told one of his friends, "has caused the greatest revolution in our time."
Other modernists agree: Virginia Woolf, claiming that in a about 1910 "human character changed" and illustrating the new balance between the sexes, urged, "Read the 'Agamemon' and see whether your sympathies are not almost entirely with Clytemnestra". D.H. Lawrence wrote "perhaps the deepest fight for 200 years and more has been the fight for women's independence".
But if modernist writers considered women's revolt against men's domination as one of their "greatest" and "deepest" themes, only recently, perhaps in the past 15 years has literary criticism begun to catch up with it. Not that the images of sexual antagonism that abound in modern literature have gone unremarked - far from it. We are able to see in literary works the perspective we bring to them and now that women are enough to make a difference in reforming canons and interpreting literature, the landscapes of literary history and the features of individual books have begun to change. - Choose the correct sentence
- Fill in the blanks and choose the correct definition for the punctuation.
______ is used to indicate possession. - Fill in the blanks and choose the correct definition for the punctuation.
______ is used to mark the end of declarative and imperative sentences.
View More Questions
Top SNAP Questions
- In a retail outlet, the average revenue was Rs.10,000 per day over a 30 day period. During this period, the average revenue on weekends (total 8 days) was Rs. 20,000 per day. What was the average daily revenue on weekdays?
- Two different prime numbers X and Y, both are greater than 2, then which of the following must be true?
- It takes 6 hours for pump A, used alone, to fill a tank of water. Pump B alone takes 8 hours to fill the same tank. A, B and another pump C all together fill the tank in 2 hours. How long would pump C take, used alone, to fill the tank?
- A swimming pool can be filled by pipe A in 3 hours and by pipe B in 6 hours, each pump working on its own. At 9 am, pump A is started. At what time will the swimming pool be filled if pump B is started at 10 am?
- The sum of prime numbers that are greater than 60, but less than 70 is :
View More Questions