The Sunday Times/Faber Literary Quiz

[phoenixxx]

All ready? My early thoughts:

FRUIT (2) Peach (James and the Giant Peach, Roald Dahl)

AEROPLANES (3) Hungarian (The English Patient)
(5) Philip Swallow and Morris Zapp (David Lodge story)

PICTURES (4) Rebecca Miller
(5) Julian Barnes
I am happy to stand corrected. All contributions welcome.

[goodfriday]

Thanks, whiskypriest. What about Don Juan for Madhouses 5?? I haven't read it since 1982, so another epic search is called for.

[goodfriday]

Thanks, whiskypriest. What about Don Juan for Madhouses 5? I haven't read it since 1982, so another 'epic' search is called for.

[Eslite]

Bodily Oddities 3
Sufiya Zinobia (Shame, Salman Rushdie)

[phoenixxx]

Madhouses 2 - is it part of Paradise Lost? Anyone more familiar with the text than I am?

[Eslite]

Aeroplanes 2
Mary Postgate (Kipling)

[slaney]

I think Madhouses 5 is Antonio (or Francisicus) from The Changeling by Middleton/Rowley.

[whiskypriest]

AEROPLANES 1 - Philip Larkin ('Naturally the Foundation with Bear Your Expenses')

Name of character for Trains 2 is Marjorie Mayhew

I'm having no luck with our underground asylum. Im pouring through my volumes of Byron, Milton and Dante (heavy going!) but have not yet come up with anything. Will keep trying.

[LG123]

Hi all - i'm a bit behind, so apologies if I repeat anything you already have:

Bodily Oddities 2 - Richard III
Trains 5 - Mabel Warren, Stamboul Train
madhouses 2 - Dante's Inferno

We seem to be doing very well!

[Brookline]

I'm still unsure about Madhouses 2 being Dante's Inferno...I thought that each of the 'circles' represented there was peopled with a particular brand of sinner, rather than anyone who could be labelled as 'mad'. I know the whole work could be interpreted as straight from the asylum, but can LG123 explain why it's definitely so, please?! Many thanks

[Flapwing]

Gosh - nearly done
I think Fruit 3 may be Fiesta melons by Sylvia Plath
Aeroplanes 5 : Philip Swallow and Morris Zapp - Changing Places - David Lodge
Aeroplanes 1 may be Henry Porter In Remembrance Day.

[phoenixxx]

We have done exceptionally well this year! We appear to have answers for all the questions except Trains 1. (Could that be Hardy?)

New arrivals are adding suggestions. Is that because they have not read all the correspondence or because they feel we have made some errors?

Perhaps we could now sort out a list of definites and then share the checking between us.

[Ray The Grey]

Trains 1 & Madhouses 2 are missing - Dante's Inferno is not set in a subterranean madhouse.
Criminals 5 - Peer Gynt is a Scandinavian fraudster, but he ends up with his mother. I am not convinced the answer is right.
Bodily Oddities 1 - Is Griffin a Science Teacher - all the rest seems to fit?
There are a few others I have not been able to confirm absolutely yet - Pics 1, Aeroplanes 1, Madhouses 1, Battles 3 & 5 - but these all seem sound.
The rest I have checked and confirmed.

[Eslite]

Trains 1 Anna Karenina ?

[Ray The Grey]

Anna Karenina looks quite good for Trains 1, but is she a would-be seducer? Also, is she fleeing Vronsky as much as her husband?
I have now confirmed - Aeroplanes 1, Madhouses 1 & Battles 3.

[kennypilot]

Ray the Grey pictures 1 is definitely Ballard- it's in his book Shanghai to Shepperton. Griffin is said to be a science student, but no mention of teaching that I have yet found. Have you confirmed that picture 2 is Norman Lewis? I haven't been ableto find any pictures of him as a young man.

[whiskypriest]

Peer Gynt is banished. I feel that this constitiutes him ending up out in the cold. I can't think of any other Ibsen/Strindberg characters that meet that criteria, and the use of the word 'Scandinavian' in the Sunday Times/Faber Literary Quiz usually indicates that one of those two authors is involved!

I do not think TRAINS 1 is Anna Karenina. 'Would-be seducer' suggests a man to me. (Apologies to all male quizzers out there!)

RE: TRAINS 4. I think that the initial suggestion of Dibdin's 'Cabal' may be the correct one, although I do not have a copy in order to check. I have Gide's 'Vatican Cellars' and although someone is thrown from a train between Rome and Naples there is no reference to the train in question being a pendolino. Surely pendolinoes did not exist at the time of Gide's writing? I'm happy to stand corrected by any trainspotters out there. In addtion, Dibdin usually features in the quiz somewhere because he's published by Faber. Cynical but true.

[Ray The Grey]

The picture of Norman Lewis looks a lot like the older photos of him I have seen - long face, big ears - the child at the back. The photo looks to be the right age and the fact that he wrote the book Naples '44 clinches it for me. I assume the photo is from his autobiography "A Semi-Invisible Man" - if anyone has it.

[LG123]

Sorry all, you're quite right it's not Dante. My new thought is maybe William Blake - anyone got any thoughts?

[goodfriday]

Madhouses 2. No, I'm still stuck on this. Am looking through Milton. Coleridge could be a possibility, too. I've also thought about WW1 poetry but the inference from the question is that it is a long poem ('section').

[Ray The Grey]

I found Madhouses 2 - finally via the Earl of Rochester....

It is the Rake's Progress by WH Auden and Chester Kallman (Act 3 Scene 3). Rakewell is in Bedlam and the chorus sing about the city above. Although, it's a libretto from an opera - it seems spot on - and Auden co-wrote it.