Literature Trivia Questions
Total Questions: 2000
Which author set her first novel, 1936's 'We the Living', in her native Russia?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
ayn rand
In which Shakespeare play does Miranda tell Prospero in scene 2 that she's seen a shipwreck?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
tempest
What Shakespeare play starts on a ship and concludes in front of a cell?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
tempest
Who is the Canadian author of 'Alias Grace' and 'The Handmaid's Tale'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
margaret atwood
Who is the C.S. Forester character that was the commander of the H.M.S. Lydia, a 36-gun frigate?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
horatio hornblower
Which Shakespeare comedy was adapted into a 1993 film by Kenneth Branagh, featuring Denzel Washington as Don Pedro?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
much ado about nothing
Who is the priest renowned for his novel 'The God Game' and his work titled 'Cardinal Sins'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
andrew greeley
What character from an 1865 work is known for its ability to disappear at will, leaving only its grin behind?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
cheshire cat
Which gang leader from Charles Dickens' 'Oliver Twist' is captured and executed after Bill Sykes accidentally hangs himself?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
fagin
In 1590, the first three books of which proposed 24-book epic poem by Edmund Spenser were published?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
faerie queene
Which author wrote a novel in which Maggie Verver buys a flawed golden bowl?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
henry james
According to Marlowe, what should be 'accursed' as the first invention?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
war
In what language did Petronius write his 'Satyricon' using its vulgar form?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
latin
Which author published the family saga 'In The Beauty Of The Lilies' in 1996 after concluding his Rabbit series?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
john updike
Who is the author of 'Sister Carrie' who also wrote three novels about the unscrupulous financier Anne Frank Cowperwood?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
theodore dreiser
Which poet, in the book 'New Hampshire', wrote of a crow that 'shook down on me the dust of snow'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
robert frost
In a book about political strategy, which term completes the following quote: 'Those who wish to win favor with a ____...offer him those things which they hold most precious...'
Hard
Click to reveal answer
prince
Who is crowned Queen of the Wood in Tennyson's play about Robin Hood, 'The Foresters'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
maid marian
Who is the author who wrote about her father, 'Women of Courage,' and 'Murder in Georgetown'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
margaret truman
Who wrote the novel 'Adam Bede' as her first book?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
george eliot
Which Canadian-born author won the 1975 Pulitzer Prize for 'Humboldt's Gift'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
saul bellow
Which playwright wrote 'Ah, Wilderness!' that is set in Connecticut on July 4th and 5th, 1906?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
eugene o'neill
Which author had his estate, Wolf House, burn down in 1913 the day before he was to move in?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
jack london
Who is the Welsh poet known for writing 'A Child's Christmas in Wales'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
dylan thomas
In which country did Henry Miller set his travel account in 'The Colossus of Maroussi'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
greece
Which 1932 Aldous Huxley novel has a title derived from a line in Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
brave new world
Which author, who once lived in Aberdeen, South Dakota, is celebrated in Storybook Land where the 'Oz' stories come to life?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
l. frank baum
In which novel does Mr. Charrington, who owns an antique shop, turn out to be a member of the Thought Police?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
1984
Who is the author of 'The Sea Around Us' and taught zoology at the University of Maryland from 1931 to 1936?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
rachel carson
Who is the playwright known for the famous line, 'I have always depended on the kindness of strangers,' in one of his Pulitzer Prize-winning works?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
tennessee williams
Which author said, 'I didn't realize I had an imagination until I wrote Scruples'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
judith krantz
Who is the author of 'Tom Jones' who also served as a justice of the peace?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
henry fielding
Which English author wrote the 900-page novel 'Nicholas Nickleby', that was later adapted into a 9-hour play and a miniseries?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
charles dickens
What is the title of the novel in which Howard Roark, modeled on Frank Lloyd Wright, is the central architect?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
fountainhead
Which author, known for 'North and South,' wrote the lyrics to the 1970 musical comedy 'Dracula, Baby'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
john jakes
Who is the author of 'The Concord Hymn', which includes the famous line 'The shot heard round the world'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
ralph waldo emerson
In 'Slaughterhouse Five', Billy Pilgrim survives the firebombing of which German city?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
dresden
Who is the Russian playwright that wrote 'In the Ravine' in 1900, considered one of his finest stories?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
anton chekhov
Who is the young man in James Joyce's 'A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
stephen dedalus
What is the name of the James Thurber character whose name has become synonymous with a daydreamer?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
walter mitty
Which author published 'Rip Van Winkle' and other stories in 'The Sketch Book' using the pseudonym Geoffrey Crayon?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
washington irving
Who is the author known as the biographer with the subtitle 'Lincoln of Our Literature'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
carl sandburg
In a novel by Edith Wharton, which New England farmer falls in love with his wife's cousin, Mattie?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
ethan frome
Who based the play 'Camille' on his novel 'La Dame aux Camelias'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
alexandre dumas
On which continent does the American protagonist of Saul Bellow's novel 'Henderson the Rain King' have his adventures?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
africa
Which poet, known for 'The Faerie Queene,' wrote 'My love is like to ice, and I to fire' in his sonnet sequence 'Amoretti'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
edmund spenser
Who is the regimental bhisti, or water carrier, that was made famous by Rudyard Kipling's poetry?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
gunga din
In which Shakespearean comedy do the foolish officers Dogberry and Verges appear?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
much ado about nothing
Which poetess wrote the lines 'I'm nobody! Who are you? Are you--nobody--too?'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
emily dickinson
For 11 years, in which magazine did E.B. White write essays for the 'Talk of the Town' section?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
new yorker
What is the English translation of the title of Thomas Mann's novel 'Der Zauberberg'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
magic mountain
What is the 'floral' name of the 'strikingly, admirably pretty' heroine from Schenectady in Henry James' work?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
daisy miller
Who wrote the line, 'Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it's awful' in 'Waiting for Godot'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
samuel beckett
Who is the author of 'If Jesus Came to Boston' and 'The Man Without a Country'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
edward everett hale
In John Dryden's poem 'Heroic Stanzas', who is commemorated as the Lord Protector of England?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
oliver cromwell
Which contemporary author, known for writing 'The Cradle Will Fall', wrote a biography of George Washington as her first book?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
mary higgins clark
Which author is known for the famous line 'Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose' from 'Sacred Emily'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
gertrude stein
Which author, known for writing 'The Song of Hiawatha,' was also called 'The Poet of the Commonplace'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
henry wadsworth longfellow
Which allegorist wrote 'Pilgrim's Progress'?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
john bunyan
Which author, known for writing several novels including 'The Burden' under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, is also famous for her mystery novels?
Hard
Click to reveal answer
agatha christie