Question

Choose an appropriate article to complete the sentence-
Have you finished reading ___ book I lent you?
a- a
b- an
c- the
d- No article

Answer 1

Hint: Articles, ‘a, an and the’ are used with nouns to form appropriate noun phrases. We use articles to identify whether the mentioned noun is specific or generalized.

Complete answer:
As given in the hint, articles are determiners that help in describing a noun.
Let’s look at the two types of articles-
Indefinite articles- ‘A and an’ are known as indefinite articles. They are used with generalized nouns. We use ‘a’ with singular nouns that begin with a consonant sound, whereas ‘an’ is used with singular nouns that begin with a vowel sound. Example- An apple, an umbrella, a ball, a bat, etc.
Definite article- ‘The’ is a definite article. It is used with particular nouns and proper nouns. We use ‘the’ with both singular and plural nouns. Example- The Himalaya, The mountains, the book, etc.
In the given question- We can conclude that X is asking Y whether he has finished reading the book he had lent him. Here, we have used the definite article, ‘the’ because X is talking about a specific book that he had lent to Y.
Now, let’s examine the given options-
Option a- ‘a’ is an incorrect option because ‘a’ is not used to specify a particular noun.
Option b- ‘an’ is an incorrect option, because ‘an’ is used with singular nouns that begin with vowel sounds.
Option c- ‘The’ is the correct option because ‘the’ is used to specify a particular noun.
So, the correct answer is “Option c”.

Note: Articles act as adjectives because they help in describing nouns. Keep in mind, we cannot use indefinite articles to describe plural nouns.