Oh I missed the water quiz. I got an amazing ten correct on that one: 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
On the sea quiz I got eight: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12.
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Oh I missed the water quiz. I got an amazing ten correct on that one: 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
On the sea quiz I got eight: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12.
Thanks for the quiz, Auntie. I’m sure glad that Pong II is still hanging in there, because I don’t know if I could make it without your weekly quiz.
I got numbers 1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12, and 13, and I’m pretty sure I know the answer to the question that’s a clue for next week’s quiz.
boy am I behind. Igot 8 on the River Quiz, 7 on the Water Quiz, and 9 on the Sea quiz missing 1, 4, 9 and 13.
Hang in there Pong II. Auntie, maybe if you just gave him (her?) a new name like Mario, or Luigi or Princess Peach, he (she?) will feel invigorated and hang in there. Having name for something extinct might encourage her (him?) to go the way of passenger pigion.
Previous topic clue: “lawyer”
Perhaps there is no profession as much maligned as that of the lawyers. In old jokes (including politically-incorrect jokes about drunks, blondes, and meddling mothers-in-law) no other target appears as often as the ambulance-chasing, golf-playing mouthpiece with his hands in everybody else’s pockets. For instance, stop me if you've heard this one (well, even if you do stop me, I'm still going to tell it): A cruise ship carrying a group of clergymen, doctors, and lawyers suddenly sinks, dumping its passengers into the shark-infested drink. In short order the sharks consume all of the clergymen and doctors, but they leave the lawyers unscathed. While awaiting for a possible rescue, one lawyer asks another, “Why did the sharks let us survive?” And the other says, “Professional courtesy.”
Maybe lawyers get a bad rap because a situation involving them usually means trouble. But at times when we really need a lawyer, we're grateful for his or her legal representation. Most attorneys are several echelons above Joe Pesci’s character in My Cousin Vinnie, as the process of becoming a lawyer requires years of postgraduate education in addition to the requirement to to pass an excruciatingly difficult bar exam. According to humorist Calvin Trillin, “If law school is so difficult to get through, how come there are so many lawyers?” The answer, of course, is if there weren't such a frequent cast turnover on the many spin-offs of Law and Order, NBC would have nothing to put on its prime time schedule.
Members of the legal profession are not immune to the condition introduced several decades ago in Laurence Peter’s best-seller. The Peter Principle which maintains that every worker "rises to the level of his incompetence,” goes a long way in explaining why so many lawyers go into politics.
Well, before I get slapped with a lawsuit, let me call my next witness, the quiz:
Ordure in the Court
Our first question was sent in by DickZ. (You, too, can be a contributor to the weekly quiz! Stay tuned for more info at the end of this snorefest.)
1. Which Shakespearean play contains the following words “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”
2. What is the slang term for a trial in which customary judicial procedure has been undermined by bizarre, topsy-turvy, upside down (or “down under?”) shenanigans which make it a mockery of the real deal?
3. What was the highly-popular series on Masterpiece Theatre in which Leo McKern played a London barrister who often referred to his better half as “She Who Must Be Obeyed”?
4. In addition to being the greatest orator of his time, name the lawyer who, to the disbelief of his nay-saying critics, was elected as Consul of Rome in 64 BC?
5. A 1925 posthumously-published novel by Franz Kafka concerns the predicament of Joseph K., a mild-mannered clerk who is prosecuted by a bureaucratic legal system for an unnamed crime. What was the title of this work?
6. Having sold his soul to Satan in exchange for material wealth, a New Hampshire farmer has second thoughts and hires an famous orator and statesman to help him escape the contract. What is the title of this 1937 short story by Stephen Vincent Benét?
7. At one time he was an intimate confidante to the King, but the conscience of this lawyer, poet, author, and statesman compelled him to oppose Henry VIII’s legal maneuvering to give legitimacy to his marriage with Anne Boelyn. The dissident refused to recant his initial objection, in full knowledge that such a noble stance would cost him his life. Who was this man, one of the few lawyers ever to be canonized as a saint?
8. Which Charles Dickens novel (1852) concerns Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce, a labyrinthine law case that drags on for decades?
9. When his son (Junior) told him that he had chosen the law for his profession, his father (Senior), a brilliant American poet (“The Chambered Nautilus”) and well-known physician, hit the ceiling, exclaiming, “A lawyer can’t be a great man!” Junior proved him wrong by becoming one of most eminent Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court. Both father and son had the same name. What was it?
10. Disguising herself as a male lawyer, Portia pleads her case in order to save her man’s skin, or more specifically a pound of his flesh. Her defense, which begins “The quality of mercy is not strained,” is one of the most famous dramatic speeches of all time. What is the name of the 1595 Shakespearean play in which this scene appears?
11. In 1925, the sensationalized Scopes “Monkey Trial” involved a high school teacher for having the audacity to teach Darwin’s theory of evolution, a controversy which is still -- perhaps inexplicably -- timely. In 1960, Lawrence and Lee’s Broadway play Inherit the Wind featured a defense attorney named Henry Drummond, who was the fictional representative of a celebrated American lawyer. Who was he?
12. We usually think of this English poet (1772-1834) as somber as a proverbial judge in such works as Christabel. But he had quite a diabolic sense of humor,as illustrated by this quatrain:
“He saw a lawyer killing a viper
on a dunghill hard by his own stable,
and the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind
of Cain and his brother, Abel.”
13. The unlikely hero of an 1894 Mark Twain short novel is an eccentric but earnest attorney, ridiculed by the townspeople, who redeems himself by sorting through mistaken identities and solving a murder case. Each chapter begins with an epigraph such as, “Put all your eggs in one basket and WATCH THAT BASKET!”
Answers
1. Henry VI, Part Two, IV, ii.
2. Kangaroo court
3. Rumpole of the Bailey
4. Marcus Tullius Cicero
5. The Trial
6. “The Devil and Daniel Webster”
7. Sir Thomas More
8. Bleak House
9. Oliver Wendell Holmes
10. The Merchant of Venice
11. Clarence Darrow
12. Samuel Taylor Coleridge
13. Puddin’head Wilson
Bonus question containing the clue for the next quiz topic. Fill in the missing word:
The chairman of the Congressional Committee investigating Watergate, Senator Sam Erwin of North Carolina, used to say “I’m just an old _______ (what?) lawyer.”
If you can guess the missing word in above, please send a quiz question and answer on that topic to me via PM between now and next Wednesday.
Sources: The usual suspects!
I'm out of my slump. I got nine correct: 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10, 12, 13.
As it so happens, just this very morning I was kidding a lawyer I debate with elsewhere about the "killing all the lawyers" joke. :lol: And he came back with the play it was from. Obviously it's been used on him a number of times. :D
Darned, I thought for sure the Dickens novel was Dombey and Son, but yes it's Bleak House.
Thanks, Auntie, and maybe it’s time to annoint Pong II as King Pong II since he’s continuing to reign supreme.
I got numbers 1, 2, 4, 6, 9, 11, and 13, although I have to admit that for number 4, I just knew the Cicero part but not the Marcus Tullius part.
Previous bonus answer: Country
In the final months of the life of Buddy Rich, the legendary jazz drummer checked in and out of medical facilities for various tests and treatments. During one hospital gig, a nurse asked Buddy if he were allergic to anything. “Yeah,” he answered, “country and western music.”
Not everybody has an aversion to country music, though one has to admit that in its contemporary version, many of the tunes sound exactly alike, especially the plaintive ballads by female country singers. Although the genre originally was an umbrella under which one could find bluegrass music, Appalachian folk-songs (via Irish, Scottish, and English settlers), cowboy ballads, Bob Wills-style Texas “swing,” and a pasteurized branch of the Blues, the present-day “rococo” of country music is all snap, glamour, and pop, as far away from its folklore roots as Nashville is from Greenwich Village. So much for authenticity, unless you think that after a country singer struts off the stage with its high-tech lighting and state of the art sound system, he heads straight to the barn to kick around a pile o’ manure with his high-heeled boots.
The multi-million dollar music industry aside, western civilization has always had a soft spot in its heart for the pure, fresh air of the countryside. Before the recent big mortgage disaster,for decades folks dreamed of an idealized little cottage in the country. Once they signed a deed, the ink was scarcely dry before they proceeded to renovate the place! A show biz anecdote to illustrate: flush with his success, Moss Hart proudly showed his Bucks County, PA estate, all landscaped and renovated, to his playwriting partner, George S. Kaufman, who remarked: “This is what God could have done if He'd had the money.”
With that, let’s stick a piece o’ hay between our teeth and mosey up to the quiz:
I'm A Little Bit Country (and a whole lot o' other stuff)
Thanks to DickZ for the first question. Hey, fellow LitNutters, why don't you join him and contribute to this weekly spectacular (or spectacle.) See details immediately following the quiz.
1. What was the name of the short story by Edward Everett Hale about a man who in a fit of rage denounces the United States and blares out that he wishes he would never again hear of his country? For that outburst, he is sentenced to spend the rest of his life on various ships of the US Navy, never to set foot upon the shores again, and he comes to understand the folly of his attitude.
2. In 2007, a movie by the Coen Brothers earned multiple awards including Best Picture. Name the title of the film, derived from the first line of a seminal poem by William Butler Yeats.
3. Name the song often played as an alternative to the National Anthem or as an extra number during community events in the U.S. Its tune comes from a British song, “God Save the Queen.”
4. Alan Paton was a South African novelist and humanitarian who devoted his life to healing his homeland suffering from the evils of apartheid. What was Paton’s first book, published in 1948?
5. He’s a jealous husband and his spouse is an unsophisticated naif who quickly picks up the wicked ways of the city in which bawdy 1675 comedy by William Wycherley?
6. Which fable by Aesop contrasts the lifestyles of two diminutive mammalian cousins?
7. For the 1954 movie, The Country Girl, based on the Clifford Odets play, this woman played “against type” and won an Oscar. Not only that, she went on to co-rule a tiny European country in real life! Who was she?
8. Willa Cather once placed the The Country of the Pointed Firs next to Huckleberry Finn and The Scarlet Letter for its importance in American literature. Who was the native of Maine who wrote this novel that reaped such praise?
9. First appearing between the years 43-37, Bucolics and Georgics are collectively known as “eclogues,” poems extolling the virtues of farm life. Who was their author?
10. A soliloquy beginning “Friends, Romans, and countrymen” appears in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, III,ii. Which character gives this speech?
11. In 1920 Wilfred Owen wrote a short but extremely powerful poem containing violently raw imagery and a poignant anti-war message. The title of the poem as well as its concluding two lines-- which Owen calls “the old lie” --come from the Roman writer, Horace. What are these lines?
12. What is the literary term for the artificial conventions or artistic style of a painting, poem, or play idealizing the virtues of shepherds, or rustic life in general?
13. And finally, “Sticks Nix Hicks Flicks” was arguably the most famous headline of all time. Name the long-running show business periodical in which this tongue-twister originally appeared.
Answers
1. "The Man Without a Country"
2. No Country for Old Men
3. “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee”
4. Cry, the Beloved Country
5. The Country Wife
6. “The City Mouse and the Country Mouse”
7. Princess Grace (Grace Kelly)
8. Sarah Orne Jewett
9. Virgil ( Publius Vergilis Maro)
10. Marc Anthony
11. “Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.” (“It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country.”)
12. Pastoral
13. Variety
NOTICE: Please send me your own questions and answers for the next quiz via PM. The topic of the next quiz is the missing word in the following bonus question:
Similar to a title of novel by Balzac, Franz Kafka called his 1919 short story “A Country _______(who?)”
Sources: add to previous noted list: The Portable Curmudgeon, edited by Jon Winokur. New York: New American Library, 1987.
Thanks for the quiz, Auntie. Keep feeding Pong II whatever it is that you’ve been feeding him. I start getting nervous around 5PM Eastern if the quiz hasn’t been posted yet, but you came through again.
I got numbers 1, 3, 4, 6, 10, and 13, but I have to admit that the only reason I got #13 is because that’s the only show business newspaper I know. I should have gotten #7 too, but didn't pay enough attention to the hint.
This was a tough one for me. I only got five correct: 4, 6, 7, 9, 10. Question on number 12. I said bucolic. Here's the definition from M-W:
I'm protesting. I think I should get credit. ;)Quote:
bucolic
Main Entry:bu·col·ic
Pronunciation:\byü-ˈkä-lik\
Function:adjective
Etymology:Latin bucolicus, from Greek boukolikos, from boukolos cowherd, from bous head of cattle + -kolos (akin to Latin colere to cultivate) — more at cow, wheel
Date:circa 1609
1: of or relating to shepherds or herdsmen : pastoral
2 a: relating to or typical of rural life b: idyllic
— bu·col·i·cal·ly \-li-k(ə-)lē\ adverb
I didn't think many people knew who Buddy Rich was. Perhaps the greatest drummer of all time.
Well, Virgil, I'm glad you got #9 since you would have had to change your name if you missed it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Virgil
:lol: Yes, I would deserve to be thrown off this site if I didn't get that one. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by DickZ
But it wouldn't be so tough if other LitNutters would send me some questions! (Hint, hint.)Quote:
Originally Posted by Virgil
Oh and Virgil, if you should ever be "kicked off this site," I would quit in protest!
Thank you for taking the quiz.
:D Thank you Aunty. I really appreciate that. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by AuntShecky
Hey you didn't answer whether bucolic also was a correct answer for number 12.
Well, Virgil, I looked up "bucolic" in my dictionary, and it had a similar description, but the original question specified literary works about shepherds, whereas "bucolic" is an adjective that could be used for more general situations.Quote:
Originally Posted by Virgil
But just to be clear, I don't keep track of how LitNutters "score" on these quizzes. Just like Internet gambling sites, Auntie's quiz is "For entertainment only!"
Can't we all just get along?
I got 1,2,3,6,7, and 13 which I think is pretty dismal.
Previous bonus clue: “Doctors”
Dr. John Fell, who was Dean of Christ Church at Oxford in the late 17th century, was the subject of what arguably may be the best literary anecdote of all time. When Fell told a certain student, Tom Brown, that he could escape expulsion from the college by successfully translating Martial’s 23rd Epigram,* Brown came up with this:
I do not love thee, Dr. Fell,
The reason why I cannot tell;
But this I know and know full well,
I do not love thee, Dr. Fell.
*Non amo te, Sabidi, nec possum dicere quare;
Hoc tantum possum dicere non amo te.
Tom Brown’s disapproval of the academic dean is quite different from our contemporary attitude toward those with the “Dr.” in front of their names, at least the ones who write “M.D.” following them. Indeed, until very recently the average layperson regarded the physician with inordinate respect, as those human high-achievers occasionally get to “play God.” The fondest wish of many an American mother is that her daughter (or son) marry one, as television viewers swoon over actors portraying physicians on daytime soaps and prime time dramas.
Well, I'm not a doctor and I don't even play one on TV, but I know full well that doctors worked damn hard to get where they are: multiple years of post-graduate education and internships financed by scholarships, crushing student loans, and wages from his first wife. Even though it seems that those established in the higher-echelon of the medical profession are flush with what P. G. Wodehouse called “the oil de palm,” the primary motive to become a physician is to help patients. Little did the doctors know that one day they'd find themselves ultimately working for insurance companies.
But just as in the case of lawyers, when we really need a doctor, we're grateful to locate one, even if it means looking for him on the golf course. While he “runs some tests,” instead of taking two aspirin and calling him in the morning, let’s take our weekly medicine. At the end of the quiz -- unlike the usual diagnosis or the typical insurance claim form -- you might actually find a couple of straight answers.
Whazzup Doc?
1. (Courtesy of DickZ): What book by Russian author Boris Pasternak was made into a blockbuster movie starring Omar Sharif and Julie Christie?
2. What’s the title shared by Christopher Marlowe’s Elizabethan tragedy and post WWII novel by the Nobel laureate, Thomas Mann?
3. I.F. Stone states that this man “who became a legend in his lifetime” was the “greatest figure” to become “truly scientific in the full modern sense.” Who was this Greek physician believed to have lived between 460 and 337 B.C.?
4. By day he was a pediatrician in New Jersey, by night one of the most influential figures in twentieth century American poetry. Who was he?
5. And speaking of split personalities, what’s the complete title of the 1886 novel by Robert Louis Stevenson about a doctor who acts as his own guinea pig in an experiment on the nature of good and evil?
6. In which Gospel of the New Testament would one find the advice, “Physician, heal thyself”?
7. Who wrote the 1666 play whose title translated into English is The Doctor in Spite of Himself?
8. Name the 1925 novel by Sinclair Lewis about a small-town doctor who experiences frustration when his idealistic values become compromised.
9. Which Nobel Prize winner wrote the 1906 play, The Doctor’s Dilemma?
10. This term, unfortunately synonymous with “Witch Doctor,” actually refers to a religious figure rather than a “medicine” man, and often appears in discussions about Native American rituals, though the word itself derives from Slavonic origins. What is this word, which starts with the letter “s”?
11. An emotionally powerful 1915 work by Somerset Maugham features Philip Carey, who starts out as a struggling artist but eventually becomes a doctor. Another unforgettable character of the book is a waitress named Millie. Name this novel, which formed the basis for two excellent, similarly-titled movies.
12. “Doctors are just the same as lawyers; the difference is that lawyers merely rob you, whereas doctors rob and kill you, too.” When I read that quotation I could not believe that this ultra-serious artist was the source. (Maybe he had one of his cynical characters say the line.) In any event, which internationally-acclaimed writer (1860-1904) wrote that passage?
13. And finally, released in 1964, what was Stanley Kubrick’s ground-breaking anti-war satire deeply dedicated to the well-being and preservation of “precious bodily fluids?”
Answers
1. Doctor Zhivago
2. Doctor Faustus
3. Hippocrates
4. William Carlos Williams
5. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
6. The Gospel of St. Luke
7. Molière
8. Arrowsmith
9. George Bernard Shaw
10. shaman
11. Of Human Bondage
12. Anton Chekhov
13. Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.
Sources: previously noted, especially Brewer’s Dictionary, The Reader’s Encyclopedia, Video Hound Golden Movie Retriever; also, I.F. Stone, The Trial of Socrates, New York: Little, Brown, 1988.
Next quiz topic: “To Be Announced”
Thanks, Auntie, for another great quiz. This was the hardest one I can remember, and I’m not going to even mention to my daughter the doctor how poorly I did on it.
I got numbers 1, 3, 5, 11, and 13 – and I left out The Strange Case of part of 5 - but I'm still taking full credit for it.
And I’m on pins and needles waiting for the topic of next week’s quiz.
Got 1,2,3,5,10 and 13
I think that if you had noted that the answer to 12 was a doctor too I might have gotten it.
Ouch! Is there a doctor in the house? I only got 1, 2, 4, 10 and 11 right! I knew 12, but my memory did not intercede in time!
Well, I got the first five right and then collapsed. 1,2,3,4,5. :)
Last week we announced that the next quiz topic was “To Be Announced” and that’s exactly what it is. The questions and/or answers below have some connection with the three words “to,” “be,” and “announced.”
To Be (Or Not to Be) Announced
1. “To Althea in Prison,” a poem written in 1649, contains the lines: “Stone walls do not a prison make/Nor iron bars a cage.” Identify the poet.
2. Unable to make a living by renting out his little fishing boat in Key West, Harry Morgan turns to smuggling immigrants and bootleg booze in order to survive and finally comes to the realization that “A man alone ain’t got no . . .chance.” What’s the title of this 1937 novel by Ernest Hemingway and subsequent movie starring Humphrey Bogart?
3. The speaker in a work by Andrew Marvell (1621-1678) expresses frustration over being rebuffed by his teasing girlfriend. Name this poem which contains the immortal lines, “But at my back I always hear/Time’s winged chariot hurrying near.”
4. What is the title of the 1927 stream-of-consciousness work by Virginia Woolf centered around a long-postponed boat excursion?
5. For two recent decades what was the recruitment slogan of the U.S. Army?
6. Name the 20th century American poet who announced “A poem must not mean but be.”
7. In a 1971 satire, a dim-witted gardener only knows what he’s seen on television, but his tersely obtuse statements propel him into fame as a great political philosopher. Name this novel by Jerzy Kosinski, later adapted in a movie starring Peter Sellers.
8. In a 1925 poem, “Shine, Perishing Republic,” the speaker rails against his country’s vulgar and rotting culture. While holding out the seeds of hope that something better could be cultivated by his children, he advises them to keep their distance from the corruption and warns them: “And boys, be in nothing so moderate as love of man.” Name the American poet who wrote this passionate and extremely provocative poem.
9. What is the term for an introduction to a formal document, such as the U.S. Constitution, announcing its purpose and goals?
10. In the broadcasting realm, to what do the letters “PSA” refer?
11. Celebrated on March 25, what is the name of the Christian feast day which commemorates the Angel Gabriel’s message to the Virgin Mary that she would become the mother of the Messiah?
12. A “letter word” is an informal word that derives from pronouncing the initial letters of the words in a phrase. So what is the letter word that means an announcer,a host of a show, or a toastmaster?
13. And finally, a little musical passage once titled “First Call” or “Assembly of the Buglers” dates back to its military origin circa 1860. Now the ditty is instantly recognizable at the racetrack. What is the title of this tune, which a bugler plays to announce that the horses are about to proceed to the starting gate?
Answers
1. Richard Lovelace
2. To Have and Have Not
3. To His Coy Mistress
4. To The Lighthouse
5. “Be All tht You Can Be”
6. Archibald MacLeish
7. Being There
8. Robinson Jeffers
9. Preamble
10. Public Service Announcement
11. The Feast of the Annunciation
12. “Emcee” (from the letters “m” and “c” in “Master of Ceremonies”)
13. “Call to the Post”
Sources: (add to previously announced sources)
Oxford Companion to the English Language
The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 1
The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry
and the website of the Louisville Courier-Journal
Well, I knew 3, but could not for the life of me think of the title! This is the worst ever! I got 9 and 12 right,oh, and half of 11 if you count "Feast of..." which I don't. Tough one, Auntie!
Ever hear the expression, “Be careful what you wish for – you might get it?” For the past two and half months, folks living on the right-hand side of the United States complained about the atypically cool and rainy weather. “When’s summer going to get here?” they groused. Well, here it is, with enough the stickiness and soaring temperatures in its carry-on luggage to turn the most humid equatorial jungle green with envy.
The proverbial “Dog Days of August” is a bit of a misnomer. The ancient Romans were the first to use the expression because they believed that the time of Great Heat coincided with the appearance of Alpha Canis Majoris in the morning sky in which the Dog Star, the brightest celestial body in the constellation, contributed to the heat of the rising sun. The only difference is that for the Romans the Dog Days occurred in early to mid-July. I'm totally Sirius.
Unless you have a birthday this month, August is probably not your favorite – no holidays! But most folks are softies when it comes to Man’s Best Friend. To illustrate, the famous Random House publisher, Bennett Cerf once noted that books about Abraham Lincoln, doctors, and dogs never failed to do well, so a sure-fire best-seller would be a book titled Lincoln’s Doctor’s Dog. (Except, I hasten to add, amongst readers who happen to be cats.)
Hence comes today’s topic, in which the questions and/or answers have some connection with the words "August" and “dog.” So before all of you throw me to the dogs, I'd better quit doggin’ around, and high-tail it to the quiz:
The Dog-gone Days of August
1. Name the seminal historical work by Barbara Tuchman about military operations in Europe during a single month in the year 1914.
2. Since he publicly hated the feminist theme inA Doll’s House, he might be called “the anti-Ibsen. Who was the Swedish playwright (1849-1912) who had a misogynous view and the strident voice of the war between the sexes in such works as Miss Julie?
3. In Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, who was the constable who traded malapropisms with his partner, Verges?
4. In post WW II, American forces occupying Okinawa expect the two civilizations to clash, but instead begin to embrace the Japanese customs with open arms. Name this play by John Patrick, also a 1956 movie with the same title and starring Glenn Ford and Marlon Brando.
5.By what honorific name was the first Roman emperor (27-14 BC) known?
6. Name the acclaimed 1975 film about a bank heist executed by two lovers in order to finance a highly unusual surgical operation for one of the duo. (You might recall the most famous line in the movie was one word, “Attica!” shouted by the star Al Pacino.)
7. The conqueror introduced himself to a philosopher by saying, “I am Alexander, surnamed the Great,” to which the philosopher replied, “I am Diogenes, surnamed the Dog.” Name the school of philosophy to which Diogenes belonged, a one-word term that means “dogs” in classical Greek.
8. Who was the Doctor of the Church (354-430) whose youthful indiscretions and subsequent redemption inspired him to write the work called Confessions? One of this saint’s most famous lines was “Give me chastity and continency – but not yet!”
9. Winning several Best Picture awards, what is the 2008 film set in contemporary India about a poverty-stricken youth who becomes a contestant on a television quiz show?
10. To what was British poet Lord Byron referring in this line: “(?) ending in July/To recommence in August.” (Hint: it wasn't upstate New York.)
11. In World War II, G.I.’s wore these metal items for identification. What were they called?
12. The era of classical literature written in England between the reigns of Queen Anne and George I, encompassing works from Dryden through Johnson is known as what “Age”?
13. And finally, this was once a complimentary term for loose and irregular comic verse, but now it’s a put-down for poorly-executed, bad “poetry.” (Of course none of us have ever written anything like that!) But what’s it called?
Answers:
1. The Guns of August
2. August Strindberg
3. Dogberry
4. The Teahouse of the August Moon
5. (Caesar) Augustus
6. Dog Day Afternoon
7. Cynics
8. St. Augustine (of Hippo)
9. Slumdog Millionaire
10. “The English winter”
11. dog tags
12. Augustan Age
13. doggerel
Sources: Same as previous quizzes.
In your "to be" quiz, I got eight: 2,3,4,5,9.11,12. Only thing I could think of for PSA was the prostate test. :D.
I got seven in your August quiz: 2,5,6,8,11,12,13.
I got 8 right this time. Yippee! 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, and 13.
Thanks for the quiz, Auntie, and for the time you spend in putting these together. I'm sure it's not all that easy.
I only got 1, 5, 6, 9, and 11 right, but that's still a lot better than I did on the TBA quiz last week.
Thank you Quissimung, Virgil, and DickZ for giving these quizzes a try -- it makes the time spent on 'em worthwhile, though they are fun to compile!
By the bye, here's a question from the Dog Daze
quiz that was inadvertently omitted, due to absent-mindedness:
A city in eastern Georgia known for its luxuriant golf course shares its name with the capital of the
state of Maine. What is it?
answer: Augusta
It’s called “The Sport of Kings,” but thoroughbred horse racing may be one of our most democratic of spectator sports. Fans of the fast runners cut across all economic levels: from millionaire horse-owners in their private clubhouse suites and high-rolling, cigar-chomping bettors lining the rail, down to families and tourists lugging their coolers to the picnic area. The excitement is not only infectious, it’s “parimutuel!” Racing fans come in all shapes and sizes, young and old – but mostly old. Whenever the thought of my rapidly-advancing years gets me down, I head to the Off-Track Betting parlor where I'm sure to be the youngest person in the joint.
Speaking of age, the thoroughbred track at Saratoga Springs, NY can claim a history that goes all the way back to the 1860s. The larger-than-life gambler Diamond Jim Brady was a fixture at that track. In his youth Saratoga native writer Frank Sullivan (1892-1976) worked as a “pump boy” at the betting ring and once served a cup of water to legendary actress Lillian Russell. Sullivan went on to fame as a world-class humorist and writer at the New Yorker. (By the bye, when another New Yorker writer, Dorothy Parker, was asked to use the word “horticulture” in a sentence, she quipped “You can lead a hor to culture, but you can't make her think.”)
By now you can probably bet that this week’s questions and/or answers have some connection with our four-legged friends. I guess I'd better head to the starting gate before I get scratched. It is now – - Post Time!
You Can Lead a Horse to Culture
1. The opening number contains this lyric by Frank Loesser: “I got the horse right here/His name is Paul Revere.” What is this frequently-revived Broadway musical based on Damon Runyon’s colorful tales set in Manhattan?
2. In “The Rocking-Horse Winner” a young boy has a mysterious way of bringing money to his financially-strapped and emotionally-bankrupt family. Name the prominent and occasionally controversial British novelist (1885-1930) who wrote this ultimately tragic short story.
3. A trilogy by Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980) includes Noon Wine and Old Mortality. What is the name of the opening novella?
4. The young man famous for his movie portrayal of a boy wizard stretched his acting skills in a stage play about a psychiatrist’s patient afflicted with a bizarre fixation upon horses. What is this award-winning drama by Peter Shaffer?
5. He was the subject of a highly-respected non-fiction book by Laura Hillenbrand which sired an award-winning 2003 movie starring Tobey Maguire. Who was this plucky little thoroughbred who helped lift the spirits of Americans during the Great Depression?
6. “I put my money on the bobtail nag/Somebody bet on the bay” in a popular nineteenth-century American song by Stephen Foster. I'll wager you won't have to spend all the “doo-dah” day to answer this: What’s the title of the ditty?
7. Irish-born modern British author of humorous novels Joyce Cary (1888-1957) created outrageous artist Gulley Jimpson, played in the movie version by Sir Alec Guinness. What’s the title of this book and 1958 film? (Hint: if a stable-owner gives you a free animal, where should you never look?)
8. Speaking of gifts, in which two ancient works, one Greek and the other Latin, can one read the episode of the Trojan Horse?
9. In which classic Marx Brothers movie do the boys wreak their customary chaos at a track that could be Santa Anita in 1937? (Not that I was around in 1937 – I'm old, but not that old!)
10. Not long ago his likeness formed the ubiquitous logo of a gasoline company, but his origins are ancient, not modern. Who is the winged horse of Greek mythology?
11. Owned by a British prince who named him after the rare astronomical phenomenon which coincided with his birth, this horse won so many races in his life (1764-1789) that eventually no other connections wanted to compete against him. In retirement, he was so successfully at siring champions that to this day 80 to 90% of modern thoroughbreds can claim him way back in their pedigree. Who was this unique horse, for whom the annual award for the most outstanding horse in America is named?
12. Rocinante was the beloved steed of which character in a ground-breaking work of Spanish literature, appearing circa 1615?
13. And finally, in Let It Ride, a 1989 movie that enjoys cult status among racing fans, a character proclaims “There’s a fine line between winning and losing.” How does Richard Dreyfuss’s character reply? “Yeah, it’s the _________.”
Answers
1. Guys and Dolls
2. D.H. Lawrence
3. Pale Horse, Pale Rider
4. Equus
5. Seabiscuit
6. “Camptown Races”
7. The Horse’s Mouth
8. Homer’s Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid
9. A Day at the Races
10. Pegasus
11. Eclipse
12. Don Quixote
13. Finish Line!
Thanks for the quiz, Auntie. The week just doesn't seem right until your quiz comes out.
I got numbers 3, 5, 6, 9, and 10.
Darn I should have gotten Seabiscuit. I enjoyed the movie, but it just wouldn't come to me. Overall I got six: 2, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12.
Thank you, DickZ and Virg. In general, I try to keep a semblance of a "literary" connection in each q. and a., but nonetheless I wish I'd had room to have included the following:
National Velvet
Black Beauty (by Anna Sewell)
The Sting (1973) starring Robert Redford and the late, great Paul Newman and . . . .
Bucephalus!
(Maybe they'll all gallop in some future quiz.)
Gee, Auntie - while I remember a great carousel in The Sting, which is a fantastic movie, I don't recall too many horses. Unless of course, you're referring to the racetracks that were never actually shown in the film.
Rock ‘n’ Roll pioneers Bill Haley and the Comets famously opened Big Joe Turner’s “Shake, Rattle, and Roll” with the line “Get out in that kitchen and rattle those pots and pans!” Today, August 26, Women’s Equality Day, reminds us that we can, if we so desire, unchain ourselves from the stove. Besides, it’s too hot to cook. Nonetheless, the questions and/or answers in the quiz this time contain some form of the words “pot” or “pan.”
1. “All is the for the best in this best of all possible worlds,” said the ever-upbeat, sometimes grating mentor to Candide. (But hey, who couldn't use a supersized helping of optimism these days?) Name this character created by Voltaire 250 years ago.
2. In ancient Greece, he was the god of so much of creation –fields, meadows, forests, flocks - that his name literally meant “everything.” Who was this mythological deity, depicted as half-man, half-goat and often tootling on a pipe?
3. What’s the term for a piece of work done for no other purpose than for money, merely to keep food cooking on the stove? (It usually refers to a writer cranking out something to produce a quick sale, to keep him going to pursue loftier literary goals.)
4. With an upper case “p” it is the name Milton gave to the capital city of Hell; with a lower case initial letter, the word refers to a scene of general disruption, mayhem or chaos. What is this word, which incidentally appears in a lyric of Johnny Mercer’s “Accentuate the Positive?”
5. What was the elusive substance sought by alchemists as a literal “cure-all”?
6. Required viewing for students of the cinema, Eisenstein’s 1925 work set in Odessa about a 1905 rebellion against the Czar forever changed the art of film-making. What was the title of this silent movie, which contains the iconic and often-parodied exterior shot of a wayward baby carriage hurtling down a staircase?
7. Pantagruel was a monumental creature, son of the equally-impressive Gargantua, both designed as satirical characters to point out foibles and abuses of the status quo, circa 1532. Who was the French philosopher and writer who dreamed up these fantastic giants?
8. Who was the self-educated illustrator and artist (1866-1943) who created children’s classics such as The Tale of Peter Rabbit?
9. Her curiosity allegedly prompted her to open a container, inadvertently releasing every evil into the world (with some accounts adding that Hope remained behind.) Who was this Greek counterpart to the Biblical Eve, whose name literally means, “all-gifted?”
10. What is the term for the style of silent acting relying on gestures rather than words, once highly popular in 18th century England and with the Commedia Dell’arte? (Now it's a frequent target in stand-up monologues and cartoons, maybe because it was once called "dumb show.")
11. This figure from works about the Trojan War was once a “hero-god,” but his reputation over the centuries has deteriorated so much that a modern word derived from his name is synonymous with a salacious procurer. We can find him in the works of Boccaccio, Chaucer, and in Troilus and Cressida, the inexplicably-neglected tragedy by Shakespeare. What is his name?
12. What was the perennial 1946 movie by Frank Capra in which “Mr. Potter,” the crusty, avaricious nemesis of George Bailey, appears?
13. And finally, you won't find it at the end of this quiz, but folklore says you just might find it at the end of the rainbow. What is this elusive treasure?
Answers
1. Dr. Pangloss
2. Pan
3. Pot-boiler
4. Pandemonium
5. Panacea
6. (The Battleship) Potemkin
7. Rabelais
8. Beatrix Potter
9. Pandora
10. Pantomime
11. Pandarus
12. It’s a Wonderful Life
13. The Pot of Gold
I got 2, 4, 8, 9, 10, 12, and 13 correct. I probably should have known 7, but c'est la vie.
Thanks, Auntie. I got 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, and 13. So I did much better on this one than I did on the previous one.
Catching up here and before I move on, I got nine right on the Horse Quiz -- 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13. However, I must pick a nit that the Trojan Horse appears in the Iliad and not in the Odyssey. Unless Nurse Ratchett gave me the wrong meds again.
Stuck on 9 correct. This time 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13.
Thank you DickZ, Q., and Pablo for giving this latest batch o' quizzes a try.
Some clarifications:
I usually avoid posting any questions and/or answers w/o checking them (mostly in print rather than online, but I do use online sites as a last resort.)
DickZ: "The Sting" question -- the title scam totally involves horse racing and makes reference toseveral tracks of the era if not actually showing the races themselves.
The Trojan Horse quibble raised by Pablo: you may be right, but my trusty Reader's Encyclopedia mentions The Odyssey and The Aeneid as the sources for the Trojan Horse episode, which is what I was going by, rather than trusting my own unreliable memory.
I got eight. I should have done better. I should have known panacea. I got correct 1, 2, 4, 7, 8, 9, 12, 13.
Early September is bittersweet – its crisper weather is welcome, but this month also brings Back-to-School time and Labor Day (as if some of us needed reminding that we are “overeducated and unemployed.”) Still, it’s always appropriate to salute the workers not only in America but also the rest of the world (where eventually, thanks to outsourcing, many American jobs eventually end up!)
Freud told us that along with love, work is the key to psychological health. The latter is not, however, fun. “I do not like work even if somebody else does it,” Mark Twain once quipped. Likewise Huey Lewis and the News, circa 1982: “I’m taking what they’re givin’ ‘cause I’m workin’ for a livin’.” Both observations were topped by “Charlie McCarthy,” whose lines were written by legendary ventriloquist Edgar Bergen: “Hard work never hurt anybody. But why take the chance?”
So, to avoid pink slips or docks in pay, let’s at least look busy with this week’s quiz:
That Objectionable Four-Letter Word
1. His duties included killing the Hydra, capturing the Cretan bull, and mucking out the Augean stables, in addition to nine other back-breaking Labors. Who was this super-strong demigod of Greek mythology?
2. Booker T. Washington’s earnest autobiography made him a hero in some circles; others disagreed with his preference for economic over political and social advancements. What is the title of this historic 1901 book?
3. As a prime example of a writer with “negative capability,” Charles Dickens illustrated his ability to suppress his own personality so that his characters could come alive. Yet the deprivation of his early life, during which he worked in a shoe polish factory, endowed his vision with authenticity. This is especially true in his 1854 novel about the suppression of imagination and the insistence upon “facts” amid the plight of workers in an industrial city called Coketown. What is its title?
4. Set in a sweatshop where a seamstress toils away, an 1843 poem by Thomas Hood contains the line: “It’ s not linen that you’re wearing out/ But human creatures’ lives.” The title of this poem is “The Song of the _____” (what?)
5. His best known work talks about the “big shouldered” Windy City, “hog-butcher of the world.” The speaker in another one of his poems,“The People, Yes,” says: “I earn my living/I make enough to get by/ and it takes all my time.” Name this American poet (1878-1967.)
6. Another great Chicago writer, Studs Terkel, passed away last year, but he left us a legacy of a vision of America seen through the eyes of everyday, ordinary citizens: “history from the ground up.” What was the title of his monumental non-fiction work of 1974, a collection of interviews with more than 130 people?
7. The modern English word “salary” derived from the Latin noun, sal, which means what?
8. Name John Steinbeck’s 1939 masterwork about Oklahomans fleeing the Dust Bowl and emigrating to California to become itinerant farm workers.
9. A couple of decades ago country music queen Dolly Parton wrote and recorded a song about a female office worker. A movie and a recent Broadway musical shared the title of this particular “timely” song. What is it?
10. American readers know him as the author of The Natural, the beloved baseball novel, but he received critical acclaim for The Fixer, his 1967 book about the struggles of a handyman in pre World War I Czarist Russia. Who is he?
11. The intensely expressive novelist Henry Miller (1891-1980) seized wide “latitudes” (so to speak ) in his volume about his romantic exploits in Paris so vivid that the book was banned for its obscenity. Miller used his experience as an employee of Western Union to create the corporate megalith, The Cosmodemonic Telegraph Corporation, in the companion piece to the first autobiographical novel. What was the title of this slightly lesser-known Henry Miller work?
12. This French author (1840-1902) devoted much of his life to championing the cause of justice, notably in the Alfred Dreyfus case. His novel, Germinal, about European coal miners also helped elicit sympathy for exploited workers. Who was he?
13. And finally, we often picture this quotable British writer and playwright (1854-1900) as an esthete, but for at least one day of his life he did actually engage in manual labor, when his professor, John Ruskin, recruited his undergraduates to build a road between Oxford and a nearby village. Unfortunately the road was never completed, although a resident of the little town later remarked, “I don’t think the young gentlemen did much harm.” Who was Ruskin’s famous student, known for bon mots such as “Work is the curse of the drinking class”?
Answers:
1. Heracles (Hercules)
2. Up from Slavery
3. Hard Times
4. “(The Song of the) Shirt”
5. Carl Sandburg
6. Working
7. Salt (Salt was such a valuable commodity in ancient times that it was used to pay Roman soldiers; thus, the origin of the expression, “Not worth his salt.”)
8. The Grapes of Wrath
9. “Nine to Five”
10. Bernard Malumud
11. The Tropic of Capricorn
12. Emile Zola
13. Oscar Wilde
Sources (All highly recommended):
The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes,
The Oxford Companion to English Literature, edited by Margaret Drabble,
and podcasts available on www.npr.org, especially the programs on Studs Terkel and Beowulf on the Beach by Jack Murnighan.