Written in Black and White Trivia Quiz

Answer: Black

Rumer Godden's 1939 novel "Black Narcissus" follows a group of nuns who attempt to establish a convent in the Himalayas. In 1947, it was made into a successful Powell and Pressburger film starring Deborah Kerr, and was also adapted for television by the BBC in 2020.

Answer: White

Russian author and playwright Mikhail Bulgakov was most famous for the Soviet satire "The Master and Margarita". His 1925 novel, "The White Guard", is set during the Ukrainian War of Independence. Bulgakov was also a doctor and wrote about his experiences in "A Country Doctor's Notebook".

Answer: Black

Margery Allingham was one of the four Golden Age 'Queens of Crime', along with Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers and Ngaio Marsh. She is best known for her series of Albert Campion detective novels. "Black Plumes" is a standalone mystery first published in 1940.

Answer: Black

Georgette Heyer was a British author of historical fiction, Regency romances and detective fiction. "The Black Moth", set in the Georgian period and featuring an English nobleman who becomes a highwayman, was Heyer's first novel, published in 1921 while she was still a teenager.

Answer: White

In this novel, published in 2002, Michel Faber tells the story of Sugar, a young woman of humble origins who sets out to climb the social ladder of Victorian London. The title is taken from a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, which begins "Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white".

Answer: White

Victorian author William Wilkie Collins was a close friend of Charles Dickens and "The Woman in White" was serialised in Dickens' magazine "All the Year Round" in 1859 before being published in book form the following year. It is an example of the genre known as the "sensation novel" and has been adapted for film, television and radio many times, as well as inspiring an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical version.

Answer: Black

Not as popular as Stevenson's "Treasure Island" or "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde", "The Black Arrow" is an entertaining historical adventure novel set in the 15th century. The book is written using archaic language, which Stevenson himself described as "tushery" in a letter to his friend W.E. Henley - the man who was the inspiration for Stevenson's famous pirate, Long John Silver!

Answer: Black

Most people will associate the French author Alexandre Dumas with "The Three Musketeers" and "The Count of Monte Cristo". However, he was very prolific, writing in many genres including adventure, historical fiction, fantasy, drama and non-fiction. In "The Black Tulip", set in the Netherlands in the 17th century, the characters race to be first to grow a black tulip and win a prize of 100,000 francs.

It's much more exciting than it sounds!

Answer: Black

British author Susan Hill has written several ghost stories, including this one, "The Woman in Black", first published in 1983. The novel is narrated by a young lawyer who has several ghostly encounters with a woman dressed in black. It has inspired a successful play in London's West End and a film adaptation starring Daniel Radcliffe as the lawyer, Arthur Kipps.

Answer: White

"The White Queen" is the first book in Philippa Gregory's "Cousins' War" series, set during the Wars of the Roses. The title refers to Elizabeth Woodville, wife of King Edward IV, and the fact that the white rose was an emblem of the royal House of York to which Edward belonged.

The second book in Gregory's series is "The Red Queen", a reference to Margaret Beaufort of the House of Lancaster (represented by the red rose), but that wouldn't fit the theme of this quiz.