In Other Words Trivia Quiz

Answer: Tolstoi

"War and Peace", as it is widely known, was published in 1869 and is a challenging book to read. There are many prominent characters and the lives of five important Russian families are interwoven in this long epic involving Napoleon's failed march on Moscow in 1812. Tschaikovski proudly wrote the "1812 Overture" playing the French and Russian anthems against each other with the bells of Moscow ringing in victory at the end. With an ill equipped army of men, Napoleon crossed into unfamiliar territory.

It was colder than expected, hunger and disease became problems, morale was untenable, as the dwindling army marched past miles of 'burn and slash' countryside. On finally reaching Moscow, they found the city in flames. The Russians had outfoxed them.

In pitiful defeat Napoleon and his army trudged back to France. This was the beginning of the end for a megalomaniac.

Answer: Hemingway

"Death in the Afternoon" was Hemingway's first book on bullfighting as an art, a tragedy enacted over and over, with extremely bad odds for the bull. This is non-fiction and about 500 pages (depending on edition) dedicated to a subject that horrifies many and seduces many others by its ritualistic drama. Hemingway's references are only to bull fighting as practiced in Spain at the time; the book was published in 1932.

There is also an alcoholic drink named for the book, made with absinthe and champagne.

Answer: Desmond Morris

"The Naked Ape" was published in 1968 and became a best seller. Morris had been a curator of mammals at the London Zoo. His study was intended to compare the one hairless primate to the other 192 species of apes and monkeys. He concluded that the human brain was the largest in comparison to the body, and that humans had more sensualised areas on their bodies, being hairless; thus one of the things he predicted was over population.

His next book "The Human Zoo" (1969) described a zoologist's view of humans in urban areas.

Answer: Ann Fairbairn

"Five Smooth Stones" was first published in 1966, and follows the life of David Champlin, a black man born in New Orleans to a very poor family. His gradual rise in politics and the civil rights movement covers four decades, and has a love story interwoven.

The title is a reference to the five stones David carried with him to fight against Goliath in the Bible.

Answer: Ray Bradbury

Ray Bradbury (1920-2012) wrote more psychological than technical fantasy, and he covered far more than sci-fi. Some of his short stories are pure horror, such as "October Game". Some are the 'what if' variety, and they concern ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. "Mars is Heaven" is just such a tale.

"Fahrenheit 451" (published 1953), the degree at which paper burns, is the tale of a dystopian world where reading is a crime, and books are burned, never to be read. The protagonist, Guy Montag, is a fireman, one who sets fire to stacks of books, but he gradually becomes aware of the value contained in all these tomes and becomes a book lover himself. Once freed from the society he had belonged to, he finds that some people have memorised certain books, and allow themselves to be 'read' to keep that book alive and known. Montag gradually understands that books tend to provoke thinking and discussion, and this is frowned upon as dangerous in his world.

Bradbury had over 500 published works.

Answer: John Steinbeck

"Of Mice and Men" is the story of Lenny and George as they travel through the Dust Bowl of 1930s California looking for work and an opportunity to realise their dream, owning their own ranch. Circumstances thwart their plans, and Lenny's diminished brain capacity makes it almost impossible for him to be careful and secretive, while his large size and strength often cause problems. George finally realises this as he tells Lenny his favorite story of their own ranch and the soft fluffy animals they will have, to comfort him before shooting him in the back of the head.

The title is taken from the poem by Robert Burns, from the line "...the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley" (often go wrong).

Answer: Emily Bronte

"Wuthering Heights" (published in 1847) is a complex story of love and vengeance and begins as a narrative told about the ghost of Catherine, who still wanders the moors looking for her love, Heathcliff. Their passionate love for each other was torn apart by other people, misunderstandings and the circumstances they lived in. The book was compared to "Jane Eyre" (Charlotte Bronte), a favorite at the time, and at first thought inferior, but has risen in favor and is generally thought to be the best of the Bronte works.

Emily died only two years after the book was written. Films have been made of the story, the first starring Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon in 1939.

Answer: Jack London

"The Call of the Wild" is the story of Buck, a brave and powerful sled dog of mixed Saint Bernard and Scottish Collie parentage, and his master's love for him. The story takes place during the Yukon gold rush in the 1890s. Thornton found Buck, an abused but tough dog, leading a pack of sled dogs whose masters were heading onto unsafe melting ice. Thornton cut Buck free and the sled team took off ignoring his advice, and crashed through the ice where the men and dogs all drowned. Buck and Thornton came to love each other and Buck once won his new master a great deal of money by proving the crowd wrong that he could not dislodge a 1000 pound sled frozen in the ice. Buck eventually heard 'the call' when a young female dog enticed him into the woods, but he returned to visit Thornton every year and mourned his passing.

Jack London specialised in stories and poems of the Yukon areas and the lifestyles involved.

Answer: Robert Munsch

"Purple, Green and Yellow" is the title and these are the colors that represent the festival of Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday). The book itself, published in 2007, is primarily for children, and centers around Brigid, a girl who loves coloring with felt markers. Her mother buys the markers for her, and Brigid progresses from washable markers to fragrant ones to the perfect 'super-indelible-never-comes-off-till-you're-dead-and-maybe-later'. She is then tempted to color her nails, her fingers, her belly button and the story progresses to I'm not telling the end.

Robert Munsch was graduated from Fordham U. with a degree in history, and then from Boston U. with a degree in anthropology.

Answer: Chinua Achebe

"Things Fall Apart", a novel, takes its title from the W.B. Yeats poem "The Second Coming", a very cold look at the return of a 'messiah' - not the one we expected. The novel was published in 1958, when Achebe was only 28 years old; it has sold over ten million copies. The story tells of Nigerian born Okonkwo, 'a strong man' with a terrible fear of failure. Both his father and his son have the potential to disgrace him.

Amazon books has rated the book as one of the top 100 books to be read in a lifetime, and its popularity has outshone Achebe's several other books. Achebe died in 2012 at the age of 82.