Where Were They Born? Quiz Challenge - How Much Do You Know? | People

Answer: France

Although she wrote under the pseudonym George Sand, she was born Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin in Paris in 1804.

She is probably known as much for her much-publicized affairs with the likes of Polish pianist Frédéric Chopin and French writer Alfred de Musset as for her writing. The 1945 Charles Vidor biopic, "A Song to Remember (1945)", starred Merle Oberon as Sand and Cornel Wilde as Chopin.

Answer: Canada

Andrew Bonar Law was born in 1858 in the village of Kingston in Kent County in what was then the Colony of New Brunswick in British North America. In 1867, New Brunswick was one of the four states that united to form the Dominion of Canada. In 1901, the village of Kingston was renamed Rexton, thus avoiding confusion with the other Kingston in New Brunswick, which is in King's County and still carries the name today.

Law became Prime Minister of Great Britain (the only one ever born outside the British Isles) as leader of the Conservative Party by winning the General Election in November 1922, ousting Liberal leader David Lloyd George. Shortly after taking office, Law was diagnosed with terminal throat cancer. Unable to speak in Parliament, he resigned (and was replaced by Stanley Baldwin) after just six months in office: the shortest premiership of the 20th century. Law died aged 65 before the year was out.

Answer: USA

Although Kidman made her screen debut in 1983, it in the 1990 film "Days of Thunder" that she not only became a star as an actress, but as a celebrity too by marrying her co-star Tom Cruise. She won a Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal as Virginia Woolf in the 2002 film "The Hours". She was also nominated in 2001 and 2010, and in 2016 for the Best Supporting Actress award.

In 2008, Kidman highlighted her upbringing by starring in the epic Western "Australia", one of the highest-grossing Australian films of all time. She is not, though, a native Australian: she was born in 1967 in Honolulu, Hawaii to Australian parents who were living in the USA on educational visas. Kidman spent most of her childhood in Australia but has always held joint Australian and USA citizenship.

Answer: Russia

Born Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum in 1905 in Saint Petersburg, Ayn Rand was educated in her native Russia but moved to the USA at the age of 21 and became a citizen in 1931.

After two relatively unsuccessful novels and a Broadway play, Rand became a best-seller with her 1943 philosophical novel "The Fountainhead". She is best-known today for her longest and last novel, the 1957 dystopian/sci-fi epic "Atlas Shrugged".

Answer: Iran

Doris May Tayler was born to British parents in 1919 in the city of Kermanshah, 325 miles from Tehran in western Iran. When she was six years old, the family moved to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Twice divorced (one of them to German political activist Gottfried Lessing), she moved to London (with the youngest of her three sons) to pursue her writing career.

By the time of her death at the age of 94 in 2013, Lessing had written more than 50 novels. They can be divided into three main categories: her writing prior to 1956 was mainly political (with a Communist angle), set in Southern Rhodesia; those in the middle period from 1956-69 were psychological works; those after 1970 were primarily sci-fi, or what she called "space fiction". When she was awarded to Nobel Prize for Literature in 2007, she became the eleventh female winner in the award's 106-year history, and also the oldest ever recipient. She had turned down a damehood in 1992.

Answer: Australia

Errol Leslie Flynn was born in 1909 in the Hobart suburb of Battery Point, in Australia's island state, Tasmania. He moved to Britain to pursue his acting career in the early 1930s, but then moved onto Hollywood where he became an instant star. His first Hollywood movie was the 1935 black-and-white classic "Captain Blood", and Flynn was forever thereafter the most famous of all swashbuckling heroes who have graced the silver screen.

More classic performances quickly followed -- "Charge of the Light Brigade", "The Prince and the Pauper" and "The Adventures of Robin Hood". Flynn became a U.S. Citizen in 1942 and attempted to enrol in the military but failed the medical on numerous grounds. The studio, of course, could not let it be known that their biggest "action hero" was unfit for duty, so he endured considerable criticism for his failure to serve during the war years.

Answer: Germany

Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing was born in 1926 in the Rhenish city of Koblenz durinng the French occupation of the Rhineland following WWI.

First elected to Parliament in 1956, he served as the Minister of Finance from 1962-66 during the de Gaulle administration. Giscard d'Estaing defeated François Mitterrand and Jacques Chaban-Delmas to become President of France following the sudden death of President Pompidou in 1974. He served his full 7-year term in office before losing the 1981 election to Mitterrand.

Answer: New Zealand

Russell Ira Crowe was born in 1964 in the New Zealand capital, Wellington. He is the cousin of Jeff and Martin Crowe, who both played test cricket for the Kiwis -- many commentators consider Martin Crowe the greatest New Zealand batsman of all time. Russell's preference is for rugby league, and he is a co-owner of the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

Crowe made his film debut in 1990, but it was his performance as Maximus Decimus Meridius in the 2000 epic Ridley Scott film "Gladiator" that won him a Best Actor Oscar and established him as an international star. The following year, he won a BAFTA and a Golden Globe (and another Oscar nomination) for "A Beautiful Mind".

Answer: Algeria

Albert Camus was born in 1913 in the small coastal town of Mondovi (since renamed Dréan) in the extreme northeastern corner of Algeria (then French Algeria). As a teenager, he played in goal for Racing Universitaire d'Alger, winning both the North African Champions Cup and the North African Cup twice each. Incurable tuberculosis contracted at the age of just 17 effectively ended his long-term hopes of a career in the game.

Philosopher, journalist and author, Camus produced a book-long essay, "The Rebel", in 1951 analysing the historical development of rebellion and revolution. The views expressed in this and other works gave rise to the philosophy known as "Absurdism" -- basically, the human tendency to seek the 'meaning of life' despite continued failure to find any. Camus was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957 -- the tenth French winner.

Answer: Scotland

Sir John Alexander Macdonald GCB KCMG PC PC QC was born in 1815 in the Ramshorn district of Glasgow, Scotland. The third of five children, he and his family emigrated to Canada when he was just five years old. Although he left school at the age of 15 (later regretting that he might have become a writer if he had been able to go to university), but set out on his own for Toronto where he studied at night whilst working full time and eventually passed the Law Society examinations.

MacDonald became a Member of the Province of Canada Parliament in 1844, a position he retained until the body was dissolved at the time of Confederation a little more than two decades later. MacDonald became Canada's first Prime Minister in 1967, a post he retained for six years before losing the 1873 general election in a landslide to Alexander Mackenzie's Liberal party. MacDonald was returned to office five years later, and remained Prime Minister thereafter for more than another twelve years, until his death at the age of 76 in 1891.