UPCAT English practice question 15: She ______ the folders on the table before leaving the office.
Correct answer
A. laid
"Lay" (to place something) is transitive and its past form is "laid." "Lay" is also the past of intransitive "lie," which is the trap here.
The question
She ______ the folders on the table before leaving the office.
- Option A: laidCorrect
- Option B: lay
- Option C: lain
- Option D: lied
Why A is correct
"Lay" (to place something) is transitive and its past form is "laid." "Lay" is also the past of intransitive "lie," which is the trap here.
Why the other options are wrong
- B lay
- This is either the present tense of transitive "lay" or the past of intransitive "lie". Neither fits a completed past action with a direct object.
- C lain
- The past participle of "lie", which needs an auxiliary such as "had" and takes no object.
- D lied
- The past of "lie" meaning to tell an untruth, an unrelated verb.