Water Water Everywhere Trivia Quiz

Answer: For the Term of His Natural Life

Set in the early to mid 1800s, "For the Term of His Natural Life" was written by Marcus Clarke and published in Australia in the 1870s. The prologue describes the circumstances under which the central character, Rufus Dawes, is wrongfully accused and convicted of murder and is transported to Van Diemen's Land. Book I, "The Sea" deals with the journey to Van Diemen's Land. Books II, III and IV deal respectively with his experiences as a convict at Macquarie Harbour, Port Arthur and Norfolk Island.

Answer: Mississippi

"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) was published in 1884 as a sequel to "Tom Sawyer". Huck and Jim take a journey down the Mississippi; Huck to escape civilised society and Jim to escape slavery. This work is considered to be a classic of American Literature and deals with a range of complex themes including racism and slavery and what constitutes "civilised society".

Answer: Romeo and Juliet

In "The Merchant of Venice", Antonio's ships are lost at sea and he cannot honour his contract with Shylock, who then "demands his pound of flesh". "Twelfth Night" opens with Sebastian and Viola, twin brother and sister, being shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria. "The Tempest" tells the story of the ousting of Prospero as Duke of Milan by his brother Antonio, and together with his daughter, Miranda, they end up on an isolated island. Some 12 years later, Antonio, the usurper, is shipwrecked on the very same island.

Answer: Charles Kingsley

"The Water Babies. A fairy tale for a land-baby" by the Reverend Charles Kingsley was published in 1863. Whilst essentially a fable on christain redemption, through Tom's transformation into a water-baby, the novel also deals with issues of child labour.

The book also reflects some of the prejudices of the time with disparaging references to Americans, Jews, Negroes and Catholics, and for these reasons, is not much read these days.

Answer: Pacific Ocean

The encounter with the albatross occurs after the ship has been driven off course by a storm towards the South Pole, in an area which probably today equates with the Southern Ocean and/or Antarctic Ocean. The albatross leads the ship out of these dangerous waters but is killed by the "Ancient Mariner".

When they reach the Pacific Ocean and cross the line (the equator), the ship is becalmed, which is seen as a curse by the other sailors for the killing of the albatross. All the crew except for the "Ancient Mariner" die of thirst, but he is saved by recognising the beauties of God's creatures, which breaks the spell that becalms the ship.

Answer: Seaman

Joseph Conrad, born Teodor Josef Konrad Korzeniowski, held a Master Mariner's certificate. His career at sea commenced in 1874 aboard a French ship and he gained his Master Mariner's certificate in 1884. He retired from the sea in 1894. The sea, and his own seafaring experiences, provided the setting for the majority of his novels and short-stories.

Answer: Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf's "To the Lighthouse" was published in 1927 and is considered to be one of her finest novels and it won for her the the Prix Femina in 1928. The novel is stylistically complex, with limited dialogue, no emphasis on plot, frequent shifts in time and between the perspectives of different characters.

Answer: Nantucket

Nantucket, which was once the world's pre-eminent whaling station, is the starting point for the voyage of the "Pequod". The journey takes them around the tip of Africa and into the Indian Ocean. Captain Ahab is obsessed with the capture of the great white whale "Moby Dick" and this obsession ultimately leads to his death. Meville's "Moby Dick" was published in 1851.

Answer: No-one

Nemo in latin means no-one or nobody. Verne's "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" was published in 1869 and is essentially the story of the underwater explorations of the world's oceans and seas on the submarine the "Nautilus". Captain Nemo's name is considered to be a reference to Homer's "Odyssey" where Odysseus in his encounter with the cyclops Polyphemus says that his name is Utis, which in Greek translates as no-man or nobody.

Answer: Marlin

Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea" was published in 1952 and was specifically cited in his 1954 Nobel Prize for Literature. Santiago, the central protagonist, has gone for 84 days without catching a fish, and on the 85th day he encounters the giant marlin.

The tragedy of this story is that for three days he battles the giant fish before finally becoming victorious. Tired and injured from the epic battle he commences the return journey home with his prize only to find he has to once again do battle with sharks who are attracted to his catch.

He returns with only the tail, skeleton and head of his once noble adversary.