Modern Comic Novels

15 Points Per Correct Answer - No time limit  

1. He was a social climber, a traitor and murderer whom we first encounter at his public school -- where he is mocked for his choice of overcoat. The character is: Titus Groan Billy Liar Kenneth Widmerpool Jim Dixon

2. He published one successful novel, a second less-successful one -- and then developed writer's block that lasted for decades. In this comic romp around the seaside of Brighton, England, he's finally going to hit the big-time again with a third book... until he stuffs up his moment at a literary festival, not least because he's spent a little too much time down the pub. This character is: Joe Davenport Stephen Drake Robin Llewelyn Chris Duffy

3. The description of his epic hangover is considered to be the finest (and certainly the funniest) portrayal ever of what it's like to have had way too many the night before. He'd 'somehow' been on a cross-country run and then been 'expertly' beaten up by the secret police. 'Spewed up like a broken spider-crab on the tarry shingle of the morning... he felt bad'. He is: Shackleton Bailey Bertrand Welch Jim Dixon Billy Liar

4. The World War II pilot was crazy and so could be grounded; but if he asked to be grounded because he was afraid to fly the missions, that meant he was sane -- and so would have to fly them. This conundrum was at the heart of which novel? The Naked And The Dead The Things They Carried The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea Catch-22

5. This darkly comic novel about a man's undoing begins with him believing he is having a heart-attack while watching a football game on television. The book is: North Dallas Forty A Fan's Notes If I Don't Six Moving The Goalposts

6. This writer's novel, presented as an alternative telling of the real life he has led, included a section in which he is invited to a private dinner with Queen Elizabeth II and, having forgot his cufflinks, uses paper clips instead. The novel nearly sparked a diplomatic incident because in it the Queen makes a racist remark about the prime minister of Papua New Guinea. He is: Paul Theroux P.G. Wodehouse Robert McCrum Alasdair Gray

7. In one of this writer's best-regarded novels, a man on holiday in the English countryside is planning a motorcycle journey to Asia. But he gets sucked into the perverse daily life of the local village and ends up driving the local milk delivery wagon instead -- and it becomes clear he may never get out of the village again. The novelist is: A.A. Gill James Delingpole Ben Elton Magnus Mills

8. His satire of Hollywood featured a grotesque embalmer named Mr Joyboy, and was so broad in its humour that the film version was marketed with the tagline: 'The Motion Picture With Something To Offend Everyone!' But he is much better known for his earlier (and longer) novels set in a different country. He is: Evelyn Waugh Louis-Ferdinand Celine Ernest Hemingway Thomas Bernhard

9. Now regarded as one of the most serious American writers of his generation, his early works were full of lust and vulgarity -- and one, which parodied Kafka, was about a man who woke up one day to find he had been turned into a woman's breast. He also wrote one about a US president. Philip Roth William Faulkner Truman Capote Russell Banks

10. This writer's comic first novel was only published after he had committed suicide. His mother helped get it published and the book won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than a decade after he killed himself. Hart Crane John Kennedy Toole John Berryman David Foster Wallace