Great Literature Miscellany Trivia Quiz

Answer: Adam Bede

Though most known for "Middlemarch," George Eliot provides a penetrating psychological portrait of her varied characters in "Adam Bede."

Answer: Creon

Creon must ultimately suffer for his own flaw, and in this sense he could be viewed as the tragic hero of the play. Antigone, on the other hand, triumphs even in death. Oedipus is a character appearing in two other plays by Sophocles.

Answer: Fyodor Dostoevsky

"The Brothers Karamazov" tells the tale of the wanton soldier Dmitri, his atheistic brother Ivan, and their young brother, a tender monk named Alyosha. Pavel Fyodorovich Smerdyakov, a key figure on the novel, is rumoured to be an illegimate offspring of their father.

Answer: A Christmas Carol

One interesting version of the story, and in some ways more accurate than many of the "human productions", is "The Muppet Christmas Carol". Dickens' famous Christmas story has also been adapted to the stage and performed countless times. "Frankenstein" has inspired many movies as well, though it was written by Mary Shelley, not Charles Dickens.

Answer: Joseph Conrad

Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" alluded to the terrors of the "dark continent," and told of one white man's horrifying decent into savagery. Achebe said that "Joseph Conrad was thoroughly racist" and maintained that "a novel that celebrates this dehumanization, which depersonalizes a portion of the human race" cannot be "called a great work of art."

Answer: The Mystery of Edwin Drood

To die before finishing a novel is frustrating enough, but to die before completing a mystery! Nevertheless, most scholars believe it was pretty clear who Dickens intended his murderer to be, both from the book and from his notes. A choose-your-own-ending stage play has been inspired by the unfinished novel.

Answer: Pere Goriot

Honore de Balzac's novel tells of a man who is utterly destroyed by his daughters due to his own self-denial. Lear has trouble with his daughters in Shakespeare's play, as well, but he is not the speaker in question.

Answer: Henry Tilney

Neither Austen's hero nor heroine are typical in "Northanger Abbery"; the book, after all, is a parody of the gothic romance genre.

Answer: Much Ado About Nothing

The British fascination with cross-dressing in comedy is nothing new. In "As You Like It," Rosalind turns male as Ganymede and convinces her lover, Orlando (who thinks she is Ganymede) to pretend she is Rosalind and court her. A similar plot devices is employed in "Twelfth Night." In "The Two Gentlemen of Verona," the heroine Julia cross-dresses as a boy.

Answer: Herman Melville

The novelette in question is "Billy Budd, Sailor" in which Billy Budd serves as the prototypical Chrst-figure, thus providing fodder for school teachers everywhere.

Answer: H.G. Wells

Wells also uses the story as an attempt to blow apart traditional arguments of theodicy. Wells has written such popular novels as "The War of the Worlds" and "The Time Machine."

Answer: Edgar Allan Poe

Poe is most well known as an early master of horror, but he also wrote detective stories such as "The Purloined Letter" and "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." Though Poe's perfect metrical rhythms are a delight to the ear of everyday readers, his poetry is often overlooked by the scholarly elite.

Answer: Mark Twain

This quote actually comes from Charles Dudley Warner, though Twain has frequently been given the credit. Twain said of himself, "I am a great and sublime fool. But then I am God's fool, and all His works must be contemplated with respect."

Answer: Geoffrey Chaucer

Boccaccio wrote a series of stories collected in "The Decameron." Chaucer's shorts are complied into "The Canterbury Tales."

Answer: John Milton

This was Milton's claim for authoring "Paradise Lost." Pope, in his poem "Essay on Man" (which is not an epic), similarly claims to be trying to "vindicate" the ways of God to man.