Tuesday Trivia

1. What date in history do Aldous Huxley and C.S. Lewis have in common and why?
2. What literary work gives the “quark,” a building block of the proton, its name?
3. What was the first work of fiction to be blessed by a Pope?
4. How many years older than Shakespeare was his wife Anne Hathaway?
5. Where does the term “bestseller” come from?

Last Week’s Answers

What is the largest book in the world and where is it located?

The largest book in the world, a copy of the Tripitaka, the sacred Buddhist text that includes Buddha's teachings, is inscribed on 729 marble slabs, each 3.5' × 5' × 5", and occupies a thirteen-acre site on the grounds of the Kuthodaw pagoda in Mandalay, Burma.

How many of Emily Dickinson’s 1,800 poems were published in her lifetime?

Of Emily Dickinson’s over 1,800 poems, only seven were published in her lifetime — all without her consent.

Which well-known 20^th century, British author was a member of the Inklings, a group associated with Oxford University, alongside other pertinent authors such as C.S. Lewis?

J.R.R. Tolkien and as his son Christopher were both avid members of the Inklings.

In what year was the first mention of an iceberg recorded in literature?

Recorded in the ninth century, the travel log of the Irish monk St. Brendan in the North Atlantic, mentions a "floating crystal castle.” Since most early literate civilizations were located in the Mediterranean, the first mention of an iceberg did not come until much later in recorded history.

What was the working title of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel Gone With the Wind?

Believe it or not, Ba! Ba! Black Sheep was one of several working titles Margaret Mitchell used for Gone With the Wind. She also considered the titles Tote the Weary Load, Bugles Sang True, Not In Our Stars, and Tomorrow is Another Day before finally settling on a phrase that she had used in the critical scene where Scarlett returns to Tara and asks, "Was Tara still standing? Or was Tara also gone with the wind which had swept through Georgia?"