A molecular biologist from Madurai, our quizmaster enjoys trivia and music, and is working on a rock ballad called ‘Coffee is a Drink, Kaapi is an Emotion’. @bertyashley
Quiz | Easy like Sunday morning: Animals in books
‘The Queen has come!’ , illustration by Sir John Tenniel from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
START THE QUIZ
1 / 10 |
On November 20, 1820, the Essex, a whaling ship from Massachusetts was attacked near South America. Herman Melville, who was a year old at that time, grew up listening to the stories of this encounter as it became legendary. When he was 40 years old he wrote a novel inspired by the incident from a first-person perspective. What particular species of marine animal is the centre of both the book and the attack on the Essex?
2 / 10 |
‘The Sheep-_____’ is a 1983 book by Dick King-Smith about a certain animal that the farmer wins who then takes on a role of a completely different animal after being adopted by the farmer’s dog. What was the name of this animal (which became famous in a movie of the same name) and what kind of animal was he (fill in the blank in the title)?
3 / 10 |
A Rudyard Kipling short story tells the tale of a young animal whose curiosity about what a crocodile has for dinner leads him to the river. When the crocodile tries to eat him, the young animal, with the help of a python, pulls away from the crocodile, leading to a certain part of their body getting stretched out. What kind of animal was this curious youngster?
4 / 10 |
In a certain series, Hedwig is an indispensable character who brings encouraging and cheering letters and parcels from friends for the owner, especially when he has to spend his summer holidays holed up at home with his dreadful uncle, aunt and cousin. What kind of animal is Hedwig?
5 / 10 |
This character in Rudyard Kipling’s famous ‘The Jungle Book’ is the leader of his pack and one of the mentors of Mowgli, the human they adopt. What kind of animal is he and what is his name, which quite fittingly, in Hindi or Urdu, means ‘lone’?
6 / 10 |
In ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’, she meets many interesting animals as she wanders about. What animals does she see being used by the Queen of Hearts to play a game of croquet? One particular animal is wielded as the mallet while the other animal serves as the ball.
Answer : Flamingo (mallet) and Hedgehog (ball)
DID YOU KNOW THE ANSWER?
YES
NO
7 / 10 |
In a Ruskin Bond story called ‘A _____ for all seasons’, we see the world and the foolishness of human actions through the eyes of Speedy, who is a very clever animal. Speedy’s wry utterances and observations make up the story. What animal is this, which has been seen to use traffic signals to cross roads and use available resources to access tiny amounts of water?
8 / 10 |
In ‘James and the Giant Peach’, he becomes friends with many animals including this exuberant character who is always announcing that he is a pest. He is a bit of a rascal and his biggest boast is that he has a 100 feet, although the number is really only 42. What animal is this?
9 / 10 |
This 1923 Austrian book by Felix Salten tells the story of an animal in a forest, brought up by his mother. The story traces his life from a baby to an adult, learning the most important lesson of all that humans are dangerous. Turned into a famous movie in 1942, what is the name of the title character and what kind of animal is he in the book?
10 / 10 |
Terry Pratchett’s Discworld is a flat world that floats through space, carried on the back of four giant elephants. However, the elephants themselves stand on the back of a massive animal, called the Great A’Tuin, whose flippers move the entire world through space. What kind of animal is this, whose origins can be traced to myths across the world?
