Brain Pain: Books that Hurt Trivia Quiz

Answer: "In Search of Lost Time"

Marcel Proust proved that you can paint a picture with a thousand words, and he was supremely talented at it. His semi-autobiographical series is widely regarded as one of the most difficult series in all of literature. It touches on themes of involuntary memory, the nature of art, and the bitterness of love. Ironically, not a single publisher wanted to print the first volume*, so he did it with his own money. After he won the Prix Goncourt in 1919 for his work on the second volume, Proust became world famous and was treasured as one of the greatest writers of his age.

*The first volume is "Swann's Way" and the second is "Within a Budding Grove".

Answer: Thomas Pynchon

"Gravity's Rainbow" is often considered unreadable. It's strange mixture of dark, poetic prose bounces between topics relentlessly, and there is a large cast of characters to remember. It's also pretty funny at times. Set in the war-torn plains of Europe during World War 2, it follows the life of a man who is trying to figure out why rockets keep landing near places where he gets erections.

"Mason and Dixon" is also hard to read, mainly because of the early-American slang used by the narrator.

Answer: Hermann Broch

Not only do his sentences run on, but Broch is a master of Zen paradox. Throughout this novel, he frequently turns related concepts into abstract contradictions. The book takes place in the mind of the poet Virgil, who's on the verge of death and is trying to decide whether or not to burn his masterpiece, "The Aeneid".

Answer: John Keats

This epic poem is based on the Greek shepherd Endymion, who was loved by the moon Goddess Selene. It was panned by critics and Keats himself acknowledged its shortcomings, but I still think it's incredible. Its first verse contains the famous line, "A thing of beauty is a joy forever", which sets the tone for the rest of it perfectly.

Answer: Virginia Woolf

"Orlando" is based on a lover Virginia had. It spans three centuries and the eponymous hero abruptly changes sexes right in the middle of it. "The Waves" is also an unusual story, and is probably her most challenging work. It contains the viewpoints of six different people as they grow into adulthood. Woolf frequently puts all their thoughts in the same chapter, and it is not always clear what they're talking about.

Her more famous books are "To The Lighthouse" and "Mrs. Dalloway".

Answer: "Infinite Jest"

This is probably the greatest "brain pain" of the modern era. "Infinite Jest" is well over a thousand pages, including some 200-300 in footnotes alone. Wallace said that the plot is fractured in a way that resembles a fractal, meaning that events relating to one another are split up at regular intervals.

It follows the lives of disturbed people who either have issues with drug use or suffer from depression. Even though it turned out to be a dark satire, Wallace claimed that he had intended it to be sad.

Answer: "Absalom Absalom!"

"Absalom Absalom!" was written by William Faulkner, who won the prize in 1949. Along with "The Sound and the Fury", it has been cited as his hardest book to finish. Sentences run on for multiple pages, and sometimes he abruptly changes the subject without any indication. The book follows the lives of several people in a dysfunctional family during the Civil War. There must be a correlation between a book's difficulty and how disturbing it is.

"Red Sorghum" was written by Mo Yan, a Chinese winner of the prize. "Desert" was written by JM le Clezio, a Frenchman. "Blood Meridian" was written by Cormac McCarthy. Even though he's American, he has yet to win (some think he eventually will).

Answer: Salman Rushdie

Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomenei issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for a blasphemous passage in "The Satanic Verses". The passage made it appear that verses from the prophet Mohammed had really been issued from the Devil in disguise. This outraged many Muslims around the world. Considering its tough material, one has to wonder how many of them actually read it. The verses were spoken by a (debatably schizophrenic) man who thought he was the Archangel Gabriel, so I don't think Rushdie actually meant to offend anyone. The book does have some fascinating religious imagery, and a full serving of his unique wit.

"Midnight's Children" is more accessible and is his most widely read book. But like all his books, it is very dense.

Answer: "The Lusiads" and "The Nibelungenleid"

"The Lusiads" was written by Luis de Camoes, who is considered the national poet of Portugal. It follows the journey of Vasco da Gama- the first European to reach India by sea. Interestingly, Da Gama's crew is Christian in the book, yet there are many instances where classical pagan Gods intervene on their journey. There's even a segment where the nymphs of Venus lead them to a secluded island where they fornicate together.

"The Nibelungenleid" was written by an unknown author. Similar to "The Iliad", it takes place during a war among nations. The main character is a demigod named Siegfried, who has many similarities with Achilles. Siegfried is the subject of many other works, including part three of Richard Wagner's "Ring of the Nibelung".

Answer: Ralph Waldo Emerson

Emerson created the transcendentalist movement after the publication of his high-brow essays, including "Nature", "The American Scholar", and "Self-Reliance". Though he is better known as a poet these days, his essays were far more influential in his time. Emerson would often model them after the speeches he made as a lecturer at Harvard.

Many critics found them unintelligible, and he was even denounced as an atheist after denying Jesus was God. After that, he wasn't invited to speak at Harvard for another 30 years.