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So That's How You Write! Trivia Quiz

A quiz on people who have said famous quotes on the art of writing.

A multiple-choice quiz by napierslogs. Estimated time: 4 mins.

Author
napierslogs

Time
4 mins

Type
Multiple Choice

Quiz #
375,075

Updated
Dec 03 21

# Qns
10

Difficulty
Average

Avg Score
7 / 10

Plays
526

One at a Time - Single Page - Timed Game

Question 1 of 10

1. Which American writer, known for giving lots of blunt writing advice, once said, "All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know."? Hint

J.D. Salinger

Ernest Hemingway

Cormac McCarthy

William Faulkner

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Question 2 of 10

2. Which writer, best known for a dystopic novel, also shares a rather bleak outlook on writing when he said, "Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand."? Hint

D.H. Lawrence

F. Scott Fitzgerald

George Orwell

James Joyce

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Question 3 of 10

3. "Fiction is based on reality unless you're a fairy-tale artist, you have to get your knowledge of life from somewhere. You have to know the material you're writing about before you alter it." Which writer, known for developing subjective first-person reporting called "Gonzo Journalism", said these words? Hint

Mitch Albom

Hunter S. Thompson

Tom Wolfe

Joseph Pulitzer

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Question 4 of 10

4. Which prolific American writer and Professor at Princeton University, once directed aspiring writers with the quote, "The first sentence can't be written until the final sentence is written."? Hint

Alice Munro

J.D. Salinger

Joyce Carol Oates

Margaret Atwood

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Question 5 of 10

5. Which writer, known for many scary moments, said the following quote of fear and optimism: "The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better."? Hint

Isaac Asimov

Jack Kerouac

Ernest Hemingway

Stephen King

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Question 6 of 10

6. "The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter - 'tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning." Which Missouri native and river boat pilot, and often credited as the father of American literature, gave this quote? Hint

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Mark Twain

Jack London

Kurt Vonnegut

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Question 7 of 10

7. Which writer and filmmaker, known for creating strong female characters like Buffy Summers, said "I write to give myself strength. I write to be the characters that I am not. I write to explore all the things I'm afraid of."? Hint

Joss Whedon

Nick Hornby

Stephen King

Ian McEwan

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Question 8 of 10

8. "Show me a hero, and I'll write you a tragedy." Which writer, famous for creating a tragic hero, said this quote? Hint

F. Scott Fitzgerald

William S. Burroughs

D.H. Lawrence

Salman Rushdie

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Question 9 of 10

9. "And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt." Which writer who suffered from clinical depression said this quote? Hint

Mark Twain

Sylvia Plath

Jane Austen

Aldous Huxley

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Question 10 of 10

10. But ultimately, "There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be." Which Nobel Laureate gave us this open-ended advice? Hint

Doris Lessing

Ezra Pound

James Joyce

Isabel Allende

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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Which American writer, known for giving lots of blunt writing advice, once said, "All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know."?

Answer: Ernest Hemingway

The Ernest Hemingway quote comes from a passage in his memoir "A Moveable Feast" published in 1964. Hemingway's success started in the 1920s with "The Sun Also Rises" and "A Farewell to Arms" and in 1940 with "For Whom The Bell Tolls". It continued into the 1950s with "The Old Man and The Sea". All of these novels made him a major influence on 20th-century fiction.

Answer: George Orwell

The quote is taken from an essay written by George Orwell titled "Why I Write" and published in 1946. George Orwell is the pen name for Eric Arthur Blair who achieved great success with his novel "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (1949) and novella "Animal Farm" (1945).

Answer: Hunter S. Thompson

The quote was said in an interview with the Associated Press in 2003. Hunter S. Thompson is famous for getting himself involved in the story he was reporting on, including following the Hell's Angels and his novel "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" about 1960s drug abuse and chasing the American dream.

4. Which prolific American writer and Professor at Princeton University, once directed aspiring writers with the quote, "The first sentence can't be written until the final sentence is written."?

Answer: Joyce Carol Oates

This quote is taken from Joyce Carol Oates' collection of essays titled "The Faith of a Writer" published in 2003. Joyce Carol Oates has written novels, novellas, short stories, plays and non-fiction, is the recipient of two O. Henry Awards for her short stories "In the Region of Ice" and "The Dead", and has been a professor at Princeton University since 1978.

5. Which writer, known for many scary moments, said the following quote of fear and optimism: "The scariest moment is always just before you start. After that, things can only get better."?

Answer: Stephen King

The quote comes from Stephen King's memoir "On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft" published in 2000. American writer Stephen King was born September 21, 1947 and achieved success in horror writing, supernatural and suspense fiction through novels, short stories. He also writes under his pen name Richard Bachman.

Answer: Mark Twain

This quote comes from a letter from Mark Twain to George Bainton published in "The Art of Authorship: Literary Reminiscences, Methods of Work, and Advice to Young Beginners" (1890). Twain later credited the idea of the quote to Josh Billings who used the lightning-bug and lightning comparison to describe the difference between humour and wit.

Born as Samuel Langhorne Clemens, Mark Twain wrote "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and has been lauded by both William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway.

Answer: Joss Whedon

Said in an interview with the "LA Times", published May 15, 2008. Joss Whedon is an American screenwriter, director and producer known for creating television series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (1997-2003), "Firefly" (2002) and movie "The Avengers" (2012).

8. "Show me a hero, and I'll write you a tragedy." Which writer, famous for creating a tragic hero, said this quote?

Answer: F. Scott Fitzgerald

The quote comes from "Notebook E", a collection of notebook entries written by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald is an American writer of the Jazz Age and is most famous for writing "The Great Gatsby" (1925).

Answer: Sylvia Plath

The quote comes from "The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath" first published in 1982. Sylvia Plath is an American poet from Boston, Massachusetts who then moved to London, England. She suffered from clinical depression and committed suicide at the age of 30 in 1963.

10. But ultimately, "There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be." Which Nobel Laureate gave us this open-ended advice?

Answer: Doris Lessing

The quote comes from "Writers on Writing" (1986) by Jon Winokur. Doris Lessing is a famed British writer who won the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature and the 2001 David Cohen Prize for lifetime achievement in British literature. She died in 2013.

Source: Author napierslogs

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