There's a Common Bond Trivia Quiz

Answer: Their first name

Margaret Atwood, the author of "The Handmaid's Tale", a Canadian, won the Booker Prize in 2000 for "The Blind Assassin".

Margaret Mitchell, from Atlanta, Georgia, only published "Gone With the Wind" in her lifetime, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1937.

Brooklyn-born Margaret Wise Brown's 1942 publication, "The Runaway Bunny", illustrated by Clement Hurd, has been in print ever since and loved by generations of children and parents.

Answer: Morrissey

Steven Patrick Morrissey was born in Manchester in 1959. He met Johnny Marr in 1982 and they formed a band called The Smiths, which was one of the most successful British indie groups of all time. When the group split in 1987, Morrissey went solo, releasing eleven albums until the late nineties, when he took a break. He returned to recording with 'You Are the Quarry' in 2004 and experienced renewed and continued acclaim.

He has been a forthright advocate of animal rights, and made controversial statements on many other issues.

Answer: crème de la crème

From French, literally the 'cream of the cream', 'crème de la crème' is used in English as a superlative for the best thing, people or group of people.

Answer: California

California is the 3rd largest and most populated US state. If it were an independent country its GDP would be in the top ten worldwide.

Answer: sister

Loretta Lynn was born in 1932. She was the second of seven children. She is known for songs such as "Blue Kentucky Girl", "Don't Come Home A' Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)" and "Coal Miner's Daughter".

Two of her sisters became singers as well: Peggy Sue, born 1943, ("I'm Dynamite") and Crystal Gayle, born 1951, ("Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue").

Answer: Minerva

Minerva was the Roman equivalent of the Greek goddess Athena.
She was born when Vulcan cracked open Jupiter's head. He had swallowed her mother, Metis after she became pregnant. Her symbol was an owl.

Answer: William McGonagall

William Topaz McGonagall (1825-1902) wrote over 200 poems. He has a legendary status for the unintentionally comic effect of his versification.

An example from 'The Tay Bridge Disaster, which he wrote in 1880 after the tragic disaster of 1879 where 75 lives were lost because of the collapse of a railway bridge.

I must now conclude my lay
By telling the world fearlessly without the least dismay,
That your central girders would not have given way,
At least many sensible men do say,
Had they been supported on each side with buttresses,
At least many sensible men confesses,
For the stronger we our houses do build,
The less chance we have of being killed.

Answer: violet

The visible spectrum ranges from violet, with a wavelength of 380-450 nanometres to red's 620-750nm.

Violet is sometimes confused with purple, but it is not the same: purple is a mixture of red and blue, whereas violet is a true colour.

Answer: Grantham

Margaret Hilda Roberts was born in 1925 in Grantham, a small market town, where her father was a grocer. She married Denis Thatcher in 1951.

Margaret Thatcher became leader of the Conservative party in 1975 and Prime Minister of the UK in 1979 - the first woman and first science graduate to achieve the office. Never defeated as leader in a General Election, she was removed by her party in 1990.

Answer: Maggie Smith

MARGARET(1) Natalie "Maggie"(1) SMITH (2: Morrissey was in The Smiths) was born in 1934 in Romford, Essex.

She had a very successful stage career which she combined with a movie career starting in 1956. In the 1969 movie "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie", she played a schoolteacher who encouraged her girls to be the CREME DE LA CREME(3). It gained her an Oscar for best actress.

A second Academy Award followed, this time for best supporting actress in 1978's 'CALIFORNIA(4) Suite.

She played a nun in the 1992 hit 'SISTER(5) Act' and its inevitable 1993 sequel.

The role of MINERVA(6) MCGONAGALL(7) in the 'Harry Potter' series of movies from 2001 to 2011 introduced her to a new generation of filmgoers.

Further success came in TV's 'Downton Abbey' where she stole every scene as VIOLET(8) Crawley, The Dowager Countess of GRANTHAM(9).

Maggie Smith became a Dame in 1990 and a Member of the Order of the Companions of Honour in 2014.