0

In one of the GRE questions, I encountered with the beneath inquiry:

A book is your golden ticket into the speaking business. If you had a book published by a "real" publisher within the last 12 months in your hands, you have the calling card you need to get those speaking engagements now. Some authors-to-be and new authors have trouble figuring out precisely how to ___________ that book into speaking.
A. apply
B. leverage
C. utilize

I mused that the right answer is A or C, but I found that neither is correct. And B is the accurate item. It seems that the blank space should be filled with the synonyms of use, exercise, etc. and to me, "leverage" is out of the question.

Improve this question
6
  • 3
    to use the fact you have published a book to get other benefits: leverage means to use something to gain something else. Typical business-speak.
    – Lambie
    Commented Jun 9, 2020 at 19:40
  • To leverage is to use borrowed capital for (an investment), expecting the profits made to be greater than the interest payable. It is the only meaning of the verb, in business and literature. It seems that the answer is not correct.
    – kngram
    Commented Jun 9, 2020 at 19:55
  • 1
    The most possible answer is apply here.
    – kngram
    Commented Jun 9, 2020 at 20:32
  • 2
    Nothing makes sense here. "that book"?? which book? "into speaking" -- what does that mean. I don't think this GRE question makes sense at all, even as meaningless business-speak.
    – James K
    Commented Jun 9, 2020 at 20:39
  • @JamesK I updated my question.
    – user115852
    Commented Jun 9, 2020 at 20:49

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
1

The question seems to be based on a quote from this source:
Streetdirectory.com "How a published author..."
"How a Published Author Can Become a Paid Public Speaker"
"Some authors-to-be and new authors have trouble figuring out precisely how to leverage that book into speaking."

Including that as a question in an exam seems a little odd. They seem to depend on the examinee rejecting A and C as ungrammatical, and choosing B by elimination, unlikely though the expression is.

Improve this answer
0

My take on it is that although both "to apply into" and "leverage into" are valid prepositional collocations, the former is so extraordinarily rare in comparison with "to apply to" that it could be logically excluded no matter whether the examinee knows the exact meaning of the verb "to leverage" or not.

At the same time, as a noun the word "leverage" is not so uncommon to the intermediate or higher levels of proficiency in English. So, the general meaning of the verb "to leverage" doesn't seem to be "unguessable". That's why the correct answer "to leverage into" doesn't seem odd to me.

To check my guess I applied to the Google Ngram Viewer, just to make sure that "to apply into" is exceptionally rare prepositional collocation to be a correct answer in a test.

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.