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Tuesday, 28 February 2012 |
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Charles Dickens created a large number of interesting and diverse characters in his novels. Some of them were so well portrayed that they have become literary icons and stay on in the public mind even today. Today’s Wiz Quiz opens with a few questions on characters and stories created by Dickens, and on film adaptations inspired by his works. 1. In a Penguin Books poll commissioned to mark the 200th anniversary of Dickens’s birth, readers were asked to rank their preferences for the most memorable character. The top 10 Dickens characters that emerged were mostly villains or wicked ones, with only Pip and Joe Gargery from Great Expectations and Betsey Trotwood from David Copperfield representing the kinder side of humanity. Interestingly, Oliver Twist came no 11 in that list. Who topped the list as the most memorable Dickens character of all time? 2. The fictional works by Charles Dickens have been widely adapted on stage and on screen. About 100 films based on the works of Dickens were produced during the silent era - not just in Britain and United States of America (USA) but also on continental Europe. The first feature-length Dickensian film was David Copperfield in 1913, hailed for its pictorial composition, with some scenes filmed in the novel’s own Kentish locations. It was directed by which ‘Dickensian character actor’ for producer Cecil Hepworth. The same director later made the first British Dickens sound film in 1934: The Old Curiosity Shop. 3. Acclaimed British film maker adapted two Charles Dickens novels into feature films. The first was Great Expectations (1946). Lean had become interested in Dickens’s masterpiece after seeing a stage version written by a relatively unknown actor: Alec Guinness. Lean’s film of Great Expectations provided Guinness with his first role in his illustrious film career. However, it is the second Dickens adaptation by David Lean that is widely considered as the greatest of all Dickens films. On its release in 1948, it was highly controversial for its portrayal of a Jewish character exactly as Dickens had written. What was the novel on which this second Lean adaptation was based? 4. Hard Times - For These Times (commonly abbreviated as Hard Times) was the tenth novel written by Charles Dickens. Published in 1854, it highlighted the social and economic pressures facing Britain at the time.
It is his only Dickens novel not to have any scenes set in London. The story instead is set in the fictitious Victorian industrial town, a generic northern English mill-town similar to Manchester. What name did Dickens give this town? 5. Which 20th Century British author described Hard Times: For These Times’ as a “passionate revolt against the whole industrial order of the modern world”? This author also criticised the novel for its failure to provide an accurate account of trade union activity of the time. However, believing it to be very different from Dickens’ other novels, he also said: “Many readers find the change disappointing. Others find Dickens worth reading almost for the first time.” Whose views are these? 6. Besides being a novelist and social reformer, Charles Dickens was also a magazine editor, investigative journalist and publisher. For 20 years, he was at the helm of two of the most successful weekly magazines in the mid-Victorian era in England, working with a tiny team out of bare offices in Wellington Street in Covent Garden, London. Some Dickens novels (Hard Times, A Tale of Two Cities, Great Expectations) were originally serialized in these magazines. What were these magazines named? 7. Charles Dickens’s last, unfinished novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870), had two characters - enigmatic twins who were born and brought up in colonial Ceylon. After the death of their mother, they suffer at the hands of a cruel stepfather before being rescued by a philanthropist and sent to England. What were their names? 8. Who was he? Born in Bombay to an industrialist family, he was trained as a physicist at Cambridge University in the UK and later worked at the Indian Institute of Science under the guidance of Nobel Laureate C V Raman. In 1945, he set up the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Bombay, and three years later, the Atomic Energy Commission of which he became the first chairman. In 1948, Prime Minister Nehru appointed this scientist to head India’s nascent nuclear research programme and later tasked him to develop the nuclear weapons. He is now known as ‘father of Indian nuclear programme.’ He also founded the Trombay Atomic Energy Establishmen, which is now named after him. He died in an Air India plane crash in France in 1966. 9. Statisticians define ‘household size’ as the total number of persons, including regular boarders and resident staff, who occupy a house. The average household size in Sri Lanka has declined over the years. According to the Household Income and Expenditure Survey 2009/10 conducted by the Department of Census and Statistics covering 22,500 households, what is the average household size in Sri Lanka? 10. Name the well known English playwright, novelist and short story writer of the 20th Century who remarked: “It is not wealth one asks for -- but just enough to preserve one’s dignity, to work unhampered, to be generous, frank and independent.” 11. The Art of War is one of the oldest and most successful books on military strategy in the world. It has been the best known and influential of China’s Seven Military Classics, and influenced eastern military thinking, business tactics and other strategies for over 2,000 years. Leaders as diverse as Mao Zedong, leaders of Imperial Japan, General Vo Nguyen Giap of Vietnam and General Douglas MacArthur of the United States have all drawn inspiration from the work. Name the ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher who is believed to be its author. 12. American singer, actress, producer and model Whitney Houston, who died on February 11, 2012 aged 48, was one of the world’s best-selling music artists. In her lifetime, she sold over 170 million albums, singles and videos worldwide. In 2009, the Guinness World Records cited her as the most-awarded female act of all-time. Houston’s first acting role was as the star of the feature film in 1992. The film’s original soundtrack won the 1994 Grammy Award for Album of the Year, while its lead single I Will Always Love You became the best-selling single by a female artist in the whole of music history. What was this film, a romantic thriller, where Whitney co-starred with Kevin Kostner? 13. Whitney Houston’s highest selling song I Will Always Love You was originally sung by another American singer and songwriter. That singer wrote the song for her one-time partner and mentor Porter Wagoner, from whom she was professionally splitting at the time. The country track was released in June 1974 as the second single from thirteenth solo studio album, Jolene (1974). Who originally sang I Will Always Love You? 14. Garfield – featuring a fat cat with attitude - is currently the most widely syndicated comic strip in the world: over 200 million people read Garfield every single day in 23 languages and 63 countries. More than 135 million copies of comic books featuring the world’s favourite feline have been sold, and he is the shining (yet humble) star of his own live action movies, digital video discs (DVDs) and The Garfield Show, on Cartoon Network! Name the American cartoonist who created Garfield in June 1978 and named him after his grandfather. 15. Two times Olympic gold medal winning Ethiopian long distance runner Haile Gebrselassie grew up hearing legendary stories of another countryman who captured Olympic gold medals in the 1960s. That athlete became the first ever sub-Saharan African Olympic Champion in the Rome Olympics in 1960. He captured the gold medal by running the marathon barefoot in two hours and 15 minutes. Four years later, he won the Tokyo Gold medal by completing the marathon in two hours and 12 minutes, this time wearing shoes. Who was this trail-blazing athlete?a Last week’s answers 1. Sideways |
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