Broken Up Vic Lit 'Chicks' Trivia Quiz

Answer: Christina Rossetti

Christina Rossetti was a devout Christian who wrote of transcending (overcoming) longings for sensual pleasures. She was rumoured to be an ascetic and to have given up chess because she'd enjoyed winning at it too much. She was a highly popular poet, and critics praised the "perfection of form" her poetry was graced by. This sonnet is a fairly typical example of her evocative, romantic work.

"Remember"
"Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far a away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
But if you should forget me for awhile
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that I once had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad."

Rossetti did not marry. She died of cancer, at age 64, in 1894.

Answer: Emily Dickinson

Emily Dickinson was born in 1830. She attended schools until she was 17, after which she became progressively reclusive. She confined herself to her family's estate, then their house and eventually her room. She was a poetic genius whose output in her youth was prolific. She died of kidney disease at the age of 55 and penned the memorable first lines, "I'm nobody. Who are you? Are you - nobody- too?"

She used hyphens to great effect. Her style is unique and her poems are remarkable for being highly introspective.

Answer: Charlotte Bronte

Charlotte Bronte lived for most of her life in Haworth with the two of her four sisters who survived boarding school. Her most famous work is "Jane Eyre". She thought more of her sister Emily's genius than her youngest sister Anne's. She was obsessed for years with a married professor she knew in Brussels, but ended up marrying a curate.

She was influenced by the Romantics like Byron, but many other authors. Her first novel was rejected by a publisher, but when she wrote in a female voice, and put dramatic occurrences and portentous symbols in her next work, "Jane Eyre", it became astonishingly successful.

Answer: Elizabeth Gaskell

Elizabeth Gaskell was a novelist who sometimes wrote satirically of the quirks and customs of the upper-middle class society she was part of. She was Charlotte Bronte's good friend, and wrote her biography.

Answer: Mary Shelley

Percy Shelley's wife (and author of "Frankenstein") wrote a novella called "Matilda" which was published about a century after she died, as her father ordered it to be suppressed because it depicted a widowed father's inappropriate longing for his long-neglected daughter.

Answer: George Eliot

George Eliot was the pen name of Mary Ann Evans, the author of seven novels, including "Middlemarch" and "Silas Marner", and poems. The enduring success of her work is partly due to its realism and psychological insight, as seen in the development of Silas Mariner's character from a miserly old codger into a heroic lover.

Answer: George Sand

As a child, George Sand imagined green flowers, among many other things. She was a great reader in her teens, and began writing to support herself and others after her marriage dissolved. Her autobiography is considered one of her best works. Her central characters tend to be idealised, such as the eponymous heroine of "Indiana".

She was a Romantic, and followed conventions of Romanticism in that novel. Indiana is married to a rich older man she doesn't really love. He is quite cruel to her. She falls in love with her charming cousin...

It is, at least ostensibly, a moral tale.

Answer: Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Elizabeth Barret Browning was a Romantic poet. Her most famous poem is sonnet #43 ("How do I love thee? Let me count the ways..."). She died in Italy in 1861.

Answer: Louisa May Alcott

Louisa May Alcott waa born in 1832 and wrote "Little Women" and its sequels. Her novels became popular during the 1860s. Her feminist attitudes are evident in her books. As in Jane Austen's books, good characters often get rewarded in her stories.

Answer: Emily Bronte

Emily Bronte wrote "Wuthering Heights", which featured some cruel and selfish characters, including the famous would-be-lovers Catherine and Heathcliff. Healthcliff is sometimes viewed- mistakenly, many think- as a Byronic, romantic hero despite his lack of empathy, sadism, grandiosity and vengefulness.
Unforgettably, in the novel, Cathy declares, while going through the reasons why she won't marry her adoptive brother, "I am Heathcliff".