Quiz on characters inspired from real life

On this day in 1932, Bruno Hauptmann was executed for the kidnapping and death of Charles Lindbergh Jr, the infant son of legendary American pilot Charles Lindbergh. The story inspired the basic plot of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express. This week’s quiz is about stories and characters inspired from real life.

A leaf out of life

1 In 1959, Robert Bloch wrote a book based on a murderer named Ed Gein who was committed to a mental asylum for his sins. A year later, the book was made into a hugely popular film. Name the work of fiction?

2 Which author’s stay at the Stanley Hotel in the Colorado Rockies in 1974 inspired one of the most well-known horror stories in 20th-century fiction?

3 Finding Dorothy by Elizabeth Letts reimagines the story behind the creation of one of the most enduring works of fiction from the perspective of the author’s wife, Maud, whose life on the Dakota prairie had inspired her husband's masterpiece. Name the work.

4 Red Earth and Pouring Rain by Vikram Chandra won the 1996 Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best First Book. The novel is inspired by the biography of which legendary 19th-century Anglo-Indian soldier?

5 Which Sahitya Akademi winning novel is a historical fiction set in the kingdom of Mewar in the 16th century and follows the life of Maharaj Kumar, a fictional character based on the real life Prince Bhoj Raj and his wife Mira Bai?

6 Oru Sankeerthanam Pole by Perumbadavam Sreedharan is one of the most popular Malayalam novels ever. The story is based on the life of which famous author and his love interest Anna?

7 According to the author’s wife, Zelda, which character in a famous work was inspired by the bootlegger Max Gerlach, known for his extravagant lifestyle and parties?

8 Giovanni Aldini, was an Italian physicist whose uncle, Luigi Galvani, was well-known for making frogs’ legs twitch with applied electricity. Aldini went further, performing the same experiments in public on dead cows, sheep, and pigs. Which literary character is inspired by his exploits?

9 John Nettleship, a short-tempered chemistry teacher with long hair, taught a well-known author at Wyedean School. According to the author, which fictional character was loosely based on the author’s memories of this teacher?

10 Postcards from the Edge, which tells the story of actress Suzanne Vale who tries to put her life together after a drug overdose, was a semi-autobiographical novel written by which actress?

Answers

1 Psycho, Alfred Hitchcock made the film.

2 Stephen King. The Shining was based on his experiences at the hotel.

3 The Wonderful Wizard of Oz written by L Frank Baum.

4 James Skinner.

5 Cuckold by Kiran Nagarkar.

6 Fyodor Dostoevsky.

7 Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald.

8 Dr Frankenstein, in Frankenstein: or, the Modern Prometheus, written by Mary Shelley.

9 Severus Snape in the Harry Potter novels by JK Rowling.

10 Carrie Fisher. It was also made into a motion picture starring Meryl Streep as Fisher.

Joy Bhattacharjya   -  Business Line

Joy Bhattacharjya is a quizmaster;

Twitter: @joybhattacharj