Tuesday Trivia

1. Arguably the world's bestselling author, who has published over 20 books which were translated into 32 languages and sold over 750 million copies worldwide?
2. Which author was described by teachers as “unable and unwilling to learn," and left university to run up heavy gambling debts before starting his writing career?
3. Which author was not allowed to watch movies and television by his devout born-again Christian parents — a restriction that lead to his early interest in reading?
4. Which contemporary, award-winning author is married to a man nicknamed Pancho?
5. Which author suffered from bipolar disorder, on which he commented in a letter to his wife was like "a character profoundly antagonistic to ordinary domestic life?"

J.K. Rowling’s short story, “The Tale of Three Brothers” is based on which famous tale?

“The Pardoner’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer in Canterbury Tales.

The moons of Uranus are named after characters from the works of which two famous writers?

Alexander Pope and William Shakespeare.
While in grammar school, which famous African American writer was elected class poet at his Lincoln, IL school?

Langston Hughes was named class poet, stating in retrospect he thought it was because of the stereotype that African Americans have rhythm rather than any budding poetic talents.

Which American writer, along with Leon Mendez Solomons, performed experiments on Normal Motor Automatism — a phenomenon hypothesized to occur in people when their attention is divided between two activities, like writing and speaking?

While at Radcliffe College, Gertrude Stein was part of experiments that demonstrated the theory of “stream of conciousness.” Later in 1934, behavioral psychologist, B.F. Skinner would interpreted Stein's notoriously difficult poem, Tender Buttons, as an example of the "normal motor automatism" Stein had written about for the experiment at Radcliffe.

Which author completed a four-year apprenticeship as a chemical laboratory assistant before choosing to become a writer?

Vaclav Havel