Literature Flashcards
Longfellow poem
Title character asks John Alden to woo Priscilla Mullens in his stead
“Why don’t you speak for yourself, John?” (she asks)
John & Priscilla end up together (historically accurate, apparently)
THE COURTSHIP OF MILES STANDISH
1974 book by Carl Bernstein & Bob Woodward of how they broke Watergate for the Washington Post
“June 17, 1972… Early for the telephone.”
ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN
Carl Bernstein & Bob Woodward’s 1976 follow-up book about the end of Nixon’s presidency
THE FINAL DAYS
Austrian writer
“Das Lied von Bernadette” (“The Song of Bernadette”) (1941) about a girl’s visions at Lourdes
3rd spouse of Alma Schindler
FRANZ WERFEL
Franz Werfel’s 1941 novel about a girl’s visions at Lourdes
THE SONG OF BERNADETTE
DAS LIED VON BERNADETTE
French playwright
“Phedre” (1677) - tragedy in which the title character is rejected by her stepson Hippolytus & commits suicide
“Britannicus” (who is usurped by Nero)
“Berenice”
Name with French roots?
JEAN RACINE
Anthony Doerr’s 2014 Pulitzer winner about a Nazi boy & a blind French girl in France during WWII
ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE
Felix Salten’s 1923 novel subtitled “A Life in the Woods”
Title character’s love interest is Faline
BAMBI
Author of “Bambi: A Life in the Woods” (1923)
FELIX SALTEN
David Guterson’s 1994 novel about Japanese-Americans in Washington state
SNOW FALLING ON CEDARS
Author of “The Devil Wears Prada” (2003), based on her time at Vogue working with Anna Wintour
Followup “When Life Gives You LuluLemons” (2018)
LAUREN WEISBERGER
Author of “Goodbye, Mr. Chips” (1934) & “Lost Horizon” (1933)
JAMES HILTON
James Hilton’s 1934 novel about a teacher
GOODBYE MR. CHIPS
James Hilton’s 1933 novel about a plane crash in the Himalayas leading to a paradise
LOST HORIZON
Name of the paradise in James Hilton’s “Lost Horizon” (1933)
SHANGRI-LA
Writers of the satirical magazine “The Spectator”
Also worked on “The Tatler”
Both published between 1709 & 1711
ADDISON & STEELE
Bloomsbury group member
Biographer
“Eminent Victorians” (1918)
LYTTON STRACHEY
John Van Druten’s play based on Christopher Isherwood’s “Berlin Stories”
It inspired “Cabaret”
I AM A CAMERA
Playwright of “Bell, Book, & Candle” and “I Am a Camera”
JOHN VAN DRUTEN
Author of “A Bear Called Paddington” (1958)
MICHAEL BOND
1757-1787
Poet & painter
“Songs of Inocence”, which includes “The Lamb”
“Who made thee?”
“Songs of Experience”, which includes “The Tyger”
WILLIAM BLAKE
____, ____, burning bright,
In the forests of the night,
What Immortal hand or eye,
Could frame they fearful symmetry?
-William Blake
(THE) TYGER
Gustave Flaubert’s 1857 realist novel about a bored wife, Emma
Her husband Charles is a doctor
She has affairs with Rodolphe & Leon, then commits suicide
The book was put on trial for “moral offense”
MADAME BOVARY
Author of “Madame Bovary” (1857), about a bored wife and her affairs
Was put on trial for “moral offense”
GUSTAVE FLAUBERT
Argentine author of short stories
Magical realist
“Labyrinths”
“Ficciones”
JORGE LUIS BORGES
Argentine author
“Betrayed By Rita Hayworth”
“Kiss of the Spider Woman” (1975)
MANUEL PUIG
Manuel Puig’s 1975 novel
Adapted to a Terrence Mcnally musical (1992) with Chita Rivera (who won a Tony)
Adapted to a 1985 film with William Hurt (who won an Oscar)
KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN
English romantic poet
One of the “Lake Poets”
“Story of the 3 Bears”
Sounds like a Boston area
ROBERT SOUTHEY
1798 poetry collection by Coleridge & Wordsworth
LYRICAL BALLADS
English Romantic poet with an apt name
One of the “Lake Poets”
“Poet of Nature”
“The Haunted Tree
“Ecclesiastical Sonnets
“Tintern Abbey”
“Daffodils”
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
Wordsworth wrote “Lines composed above” this place on the Wye River
TINTERN ABBEY
Alternative title, and last line, of Wordsworth’s “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”
DAFFODILS
First line and title of the Wordsworth poem that ends,
“And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”
I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD
Group including Wordsworth, Coleridge, & Southey
Named for a district in northern England
THE LAKE POETS
(LAKE DISTRICT)
Romanian-French “theatre of the absurd” playwright
“The Bald Soprano” (1950)
“Rhinoceros” (1959)
“Exit the King”
EUGENE IONESCO
Title of a 1959 Eugene Ionesco play in which people turn into the title animal
RHINOCEROS
“Musical” title of a 1950 Ionesco play about 2 couples
THE BALD SOPRANO
French writer & aviator
“The Little Prince” (1943), also a 1974 film
Disappeared flying in 1944 (in WWII)
ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPERY
14th century (1300s) Italian poet of the “Decameron”
Compatriot of Petrarch
GIOVANNI BOCCACCIO
Boccaccio work of the 14th century (1300s)
10 people tell 10 stories each (100 total) while escaping the plague in Florence
Inspired Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”
THE DECAMERON
Jewish-American poet
Composed the poem on the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal in 1883
Also wrote “1492”
EMMA LAZARUS
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land […]
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles […]
[…] “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
-Emma Lazarus
THE NEW COLOSSUS
American “Quaker poet” of Massachusetts
“Eva” (inspired by a character in Uncle Tom’s Cabin - he was an abolitionist)
“Barefoot boy, with cheeks of tan…”
“For all sad words of tongue and pen, the saddest are these - ‘it might have been’.”
A fireside poet.
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
Mart Crowley’s 1968 play about gay life in NYC
THE BOYS IN THE BAND
Poet
Friend of Sylvia Plath
“To Bedlam & Part Way Back” (1960)
ANNE SEXTON
Playwright
“The Children’s Hour”
“Toys in the Attic”
“Pentimento” (1973 book - basis of 1977 Jane Fonda film “Julia”)
Partner of Dashiell Hammett
LILLIAN HELLMAN
1939 play by Lillian Hellman about the Hubbard family
Title comes from a bible verse about how they “… spoil the vine.”
THE LITTLE FOXES
British jockey & mystery writer
Created jockey-detective “Sid Halley”
Wrote “Bolt” & “Hot Money” & basically any book that sounds like it’s a mystery at a racetrack
DICK FRANCIS
Author of “The Once & Future King” (1958), an Arthurian tetralogy starting with “The Sword in the Stone”
T.H. WHITE
T.H. White’s 1958 Tetralogy, beginning with “The Sword in the Stone”, that inspired Lerner & Loewe’s musical “Camelot”
THE ONCE & FUTURE KING
Group of 1950s writers
Included Kerouac, Ginsberg, & Burroughs
BEAT GENERATION
British author
“Berlin Stories” / “Goodbye to Berlin” (1939) (which inspired “I Am a Camera” & “Cabaret”)
“A Single Man” (1964)
CHRISTOPHER ISHERWOOD
Coleridge’s 1816 “Vision in a Dream” (meaning opium dream) or “Fragment”:
“In Xanadu did ____
A stately pleasure-dome decree,”
KUBLA KHAN
Coleridge poem published in “Lyrical Ballads” (1798)
Sailor recounts to a passerby wedding guest his story
He shot an albatross with a crossbow & doomed his ship with bad fortune
He was forced to wear the bird around his neck
“Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink,”
RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER
English romantic poet
One of the “Lake Poets”
Co-published “Lyrical Ballads” with Wordsworth
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE
Chilean poet (pseudonym)
Nobel in Literature, 1971
“Heights of Macchu Picchu”
“20 Love Poems & a Song of Despair”
Portrayed in the film “Il Postino” (1994)
PABLO NERUDA
Chilean poet (pseudonym)
First Latin-American Nobel in Literature in 1945
GABRIELA MISTRAL
Chilean-American writer
Niece of president Salvador
Magical realist
“Daughter of Fortune”
“Eva Luna”
“Of Love & Shadows”
ISABEL ALLENDE
Isabel Allende’s 1982 novel, about the Trueba family and set in an unnamed country
THE HOUSE OF THE SPIRITS
LA CASA DE LOS ESPIRITUS
American writer of historical fiction
“The Book of Daniel”
“The March”, about Gen. Sherman’s march to the sea
E. L. DOCTOROW
1975 E. L. Doctorow novel set in the early 1900s about pianist “Coalhouse Walker”
Historical figures of the period make appearances in the plot, including Houdini
Musical stage adaptation by Terrence McNally
RAGTIME
E. L. Doctorow’s 1989 novel about a teen in 1930s NYC
Real mobster Dutch Schultz is a character
BILLY BATHGATE
American playwright of the 1990s
“Love! Valor! Compassion!”
“Ragtime” (based on Doctorow’s novel)
“Kiss of the Spider Woman” (based on Puig’s novel)
TERRENCE MCNALLY
Terrence McNally musical play about Maria Callas
MASTER CLASS
Chippewa author
“The Plague of Doves”
“The Round House”
LOUISE ERDRICH
Alan Dershowitz’s 1985 recount of defending Claus Von Bulow
Later adapted to a movie with Glenn Close as Sunny & Jeremy Irons as Claus
REVERSAL OF FORTUNE
American lawyer & writer
“Reversal of Fortune” (1985)
“Chutzpah”
Frankfurter Law Professor at Harvard
Celebrity defender of clients like O.J. Simpson & Patty Hearst
ALAN DERSHOWITZ
Bear from “Darkest Peru”
Named for a London train station
Introduced in “A Bear Called…” (1958) by Michael Bond
Lived with Mr. & Mrs. Brown
Likes Marmalade
PADDINGTON (BEAR)
Spy created by John Le Carre
Appears in:
“Call for the Dead” (first appearance)
“The Spy Who Came in from the Cold”
“Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”
GEORGE SMILEY
Fictional Chinese-Hawaiian detective
Created by Eearl Derr Biggers
Played by Warner Oland, Roland Winters, & Sidney Toler
First appears in novel “House Without a Key”
Has a “Number 1 son” named Lee
CHARLIE CHAN
Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s 1967 novel about 7 generations of the Buendia family
Jose Arcadio Buendia founds village of Macondo
“Timely” and “numerical” title
ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE
Colombian writer
1982 Nobel Prize for Literature
“Chronicle of a Death Foretold” (1981, novella)
“News of a Kidnapping” (1996, nonfiction)
“The General in His Labyrinth” (1989, historical fiction about Bolivar’s last days)
GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ
Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s 1985 novel about Fermina Daza & Florentino Ariza
LOVE IN THE TIME OF CHOLERA
Chekhov’s final play (1904)
Concerns the selling of a family estate for housing development
Ends with the sound of chopping
THE CHERRY ORCHARD
Chekhov’s 1896 play about writers
Trigorin’s rival Treplev kills the title bird
THE SEAGULL
Chekov’s 1899 play with a “relative” title
Revised from his earlier “The Wood Demon”
UNCLE VANYA
Chekov’s 1901 play about Olga, Masha, & Irinia
THREE SISTERS
Russian writer of plays & short stories
Studied medicine
Lived in Yalta, Crimea for a time
Died of Tuberculosis
Originator of a saying about “rifles” or “guns” in theatre
ANTON CHEKHOV
Born in Boston
“Daddy”
“Lady Lazarus” (“Dying is an art,”)
“Ariel”
Won a posthumous Pulitzer 20 years after her death for “Collected Poems”
Spouse of Ted Hughes
Portrayed by Gwyneth Paltrow in 2003 film
SYLVIA PLATH
First/only novel of its American poet author, who killed herself in London months after it was published
Autobiographical, about writer Esther Greenwood
Written under pseudonym “Victoria Lucas”
THE BELL JAR
(SYLVIA PLATH)
Term coined by Gertrude Stein for post-WWI 1920s writers like Hemingway
THE LOST GENERATION
Trappist Monk
Author of autobiography “The Seven Storey Mountain” (1948)
THOMAS MERTON
Thomas Merton’s 1948 autobiography
THE SEVEN STOREY MOUNTAIN
Ann Brashares’ 2001 novel
Has 3 sequels (the last is titled “Forever in Blue”)
SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELING PANTS
Author of the “U.S.A. Trilogy” in the 1930s
“Manhattan Transfer” (1925)
JOHN DOS PASSOS
John Dos Passos’ 1930s “national” trilogy
U.S.A. TRILOGY
W. Somerset Maugham’s 1915 novel about Philip Carey & the waitress Mildred (played by Bette Davis in a 1934 film)
Title taken from Spinoza
OF HUMAN BONDAGE
W. Somerset Maugham’s 1919 novel inspired by the life of Paul Gauguin
Set partly in Tahiti
THE MOON & SIXPENCE
Maugham’s story about Miss Sadie Thompson
Set in Samoa
RAIN
English writer & physician
Drove ambulances in WWI and became a spy
“Liza of Lambeth”, his first novel, about a cockney girl
“Cakes & Ale”, a satire about snobbery
“Ashenden”, a British agent
“The Razor’s Edge”, later a film with Bill Murray
W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM
John Le Carré’s 1963 Cold War novel
Protagonist is Alec Leamas, but George Smiley also appears
THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD
John Le Carré’s 1993 novel about the title employee mixing with arms dealers
Portrayed by Tom Hiddleston in 2016 series
THE NIGHT MANAGER
John Le Carré’s 1983 novel about an undercover actress
LITTLE DRUMMER GIRL
John Le Carré’s 1974 George Smiley novel about uncovering a mole
“Occupational” title
TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY
Irish author
Born David John Moore Cornwell
Spy for MI5 & MI6
“Call for the Dead” (1961), first novel, introduces George Smiley
“A Most Wanted Man” (2008)
JOHN LE CARRÉ
Dublin theatre co-founded by poet & dramatist William Butler Yeats
ABBEY THEATRE
Irish writer
Nobel in Literature in 1923
Lover of Maud Gonne, who was cast in his “Cathleen Ni Houlihan”
“Countess Cathleen” (play)
“Leda & the Swan”
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
Wrote his own epitaph, from “Under Ben Bulben”:
Cast a cold eye
On Life, on death
Horseman, pass by!
(Larry McMurtry used the last line as a title)
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
Where W. B. Yeats says he will “arise and go to”
INNISFREE
Poet
“Easter 1916” (about an uprising)
“September 1913” (which repeats ‘O’leary in the grave)
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
Yeats poem
Source of Achebe’s title “Things Fall Apart”
Source of quote “The center cannot hold”
Source of Didion’s title “Slouching Towards Bethlehem”
THE SECOND COMING
“Maritime” Yeats poem
Source of McCarthy title “No Country for Old Men”
SAILING TO BYZANTIUM
Longfellow poem from 1847
“A Tale of Acadie”
“This is the forest primeval…”
Ms. Bellefontaine searches for her love Gabriel
EVANGELINE
Longellow’s 1855 poem
“By the shores of Gitchee Gumee” (Lake Superior)
“Stood the wigwam of Nokomis” (protagonist’s grandma)
THE SONG OF HIAWATHA
Longfellow’s Ojibwe character based on Onondaga leader who united the Iroquois
HIAWATHA
Hiawatha’s Dakota love in a Longfellow poem
Name taken from a Minnesota “Falls”
MINNEHAHA
Longfellow’s 1863 collection set in Sudbury, Mass. tavern
Includes “Paul Revere’s Ride” and the quote “ships that pass in the night”
TALES OF A WAYSIDE INN
“Wayside Inn” tale by Longfellow
“Listen, my children, and you shall hear, of the midnight…”
(…RIDE OF PAUL REVERE)
PAUL REVERE’S RIDE
Longfellow poem about a worker
“Under the spreading chestnut tree…”
THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH
American poet
“Psalm of Life” - ‘footprints in the sands of time’
“There was a little girl, who had a little curl, right in the middle of her forehead.”
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Longfellow poem about a capsizing
THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS
American poet
“The Children’s Hour”
“I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to Earth, I knew not where,”
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Born in Portland, Maine (at the time, Mass.)
Later lived in Cambridge
“The Children’s Poet” and “Poet of the Commonplace”
Attended Bowdoin College
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
Character & pseudonym of Fred Dannay (Nathan) & Manfreed Lee (Lepofsky) created in 1929
Played on 1970s TV by Jim Hutton, father of Timothy Hutton
ELLERY QUEEN
Name on a “Mystery Magazine”
Protagonist/writer of “The Roman Hat Mystery”
Mystery Writers of America has an award in his name
ELLERY QUEEN
Character & pseudonym of Fred Dannay & Manfred Lee (real last names Nathan & Lepofsky), who wrote “The Roman Hat Mystery”
Has his name on a “Mystery Magazine” since 1941 & a Mystery Writers of America award
Played on 70s TV by Jim Hutton
ELLERY QUEEN
Historian & author of “The Civil War: A Narrative” trilogy (1958/63/74)
Appeared in Ken Burns’ “The Civil War” (1990) documentary
“Shiloh” (1952 novel)
From Mississippi
SHELBY FOOTE
French playwright
“Antigone” (1944)
“Waltz of the Toreadors”
“L’Alouette” (“The Lark”) (1952) about Joan of Arc
“Becket” (1959)
JEAN ANHOUIL
1764 novel by Horace Walpole
Considered the first gothic novel
THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO
American writer
Wrote for Vogue (1956-63)
“Year of Magical Thinking” (2005) about death of her husband John Gregory Dunne
“Blue Nights” (2011)
JOAN DIDION
Joan Didion essay collection about 1960s California
Title taken from Yeats’ “The Second Coming”
SLOUCHING TOWARDS BETHLEHEM
Joan Didion essay collection of 1979
Shares title with a Beatles work
THE WHITE ALBUM
Spouse of Joan Didion, brother of Dominick
“The Red, White & Blue” (1987)
JOHN GREGORY DUNNE
Brother of John Gregory
Crime writer for Vanity Fair
“The Two Mrs. Grenvilles” (1986)
“An Inconvenient Woman” (1990)
“A Season in Purgatory” (1993)
DOMINICK DUNNE
1937 John Steinbeck novel originally titled “Something That Happened”
Title taken from Robert Burns
Migrant workers George Milton & Lennie Small dream of living “offa the fatta the lan”
Lennie, strong but simple, accidentally kills rabbits (& a person)
George is forced to put him down before a lynch mob does
OF MICE AND MEN
Scottish poet
“Bard of Ayrshire” or “Ploughman Poet”
“Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect”
“Auld Lang Syne”
ROBERT “RABBIE” BURNS
Poet
“Tam O’ Shanter”
“John Barleycorn”
“Highland Mary”
ROBERT “RABBIE” BURNS
Poet
1759-1796
“To a Mouse” (“… best laid schemes o’ mice and men…”)
“To a Louse”
“Comin’ Thro’ the Rye”
ROBERT “RABBIE” BURNS
American writer
“There is no there there” - possibly in reference to Oakland, CA where she grew up
Alumnus of Johns Hopkins
Moved to Paris in 1903
Drove ambulances for France in WWI
GERTRUDE STEIN
“Rose is a rose is…” (First used 1913, “Sacred Emily”)
“Tender Buttons” (1914) book of “cubist” poetry
Librettos for “Mother of Us All” (1947) & “4 Saints in 3 Acts”
GERTRUDE STEIN
“You are all a lost generation.”
“The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas” (1933), written from the point of view of her (real) partner, whom she met in Paris
Also friends with Picasso (who painted her) & Hemingway
Played by Kathy Bates in “Midnight in Paris” (2011)
GERTRUDE STEIN
Greek author born on Crete
“The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel” (1938)
“Zorba the Greek”
“The Last Temptation of Christ”
NIKOS KAZANTZAKIS
1946 Nikos Kazantzakis novel about title peasant Alexis
Narrated by a mine owner
ZORBA THE GREEK
1955 Nikos Kazantzakis novel
Condemned by the church for its content
LAST TEMPTATION OF CHRIST
Poet of Lesbos
Creator of her own “stanzas”
For the most part only fragments survive
“Ode to Aphrodite”
SAPPHO
Paul Torday’s 2007 comedic romance
Adapted into a film with Ewan McGregor & Emily Blunt
SALMON FISHING IN THE YEMEN
American author of “The Natural” (1952, debut) & “The Fixer” (1966)
BERNARD MALAMUD
“Between the World & Me” (2015), letters to his son
“Water Dancer” (2019), debut novel
Has also written for Marvel’s Black Panther & Captain America comics
TA-NEHISI COATES
Austrian poet
“Sonnets to Orpheus” (1922)
“Archaic Torso of Apollo” - ends “You must change your life.”
RAINER MARIA RILKE
Rainer Maria Rilke’s correspondence published posthumously in 1929
LETTERS TO A YOUNG POET
1958 Novel
Part of Achebe’s “African Trilogy”
Title taken from Yeats’ “Second Coming”
About Igbo people and white colonialism
THINGS FALL APART
Author of “African Trilogy”, including “No Longer At Ease” (1960) & “Arrow of God” (1964)
“Anthills of the Savannah”
CHINUA ACHEBE
Latin American genre
Juxtaposes mundane & fantastical
“Oxymoronic”
MAGIC(AL) REALISM
3-word phrase used by a journalist or ghostwriter, referring to their conversations with the subject
AS-TOLD-TO
Bengali writer (Kolkata-born)
1913 Nobel for Literature
Wrote Bangladesh’s anthem (1905) & India’s (1911)
RABINDRANATH TAGORE
Partner of Gertrude Stein, whom she met in Paris
In the title of a Stein work
Published her own cookbook in 1954
ALICE B. TOKLAS
Lucrezia Borgia is the evil queen in this Maguire retelling of a fairy tale
MIRROR, MIRROR
1959 play by Lorraine Hansberry
About the Younger family on Chicago’s Southside
Title from a Langston Hughes poem
1st Broadway production written by a black American woman
A RAISIN IN THE SUN
American playwright
Born in Chicago
“To Be Young, Gifted, & Black”
LORRAINE HANSBERRY
1973 musical based on a Lorraine Hansberry play
One-word title
RAISIN
1937 novel by Zora Neale Hurston
About Janie Crawford & her 3 marriages
THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD
American author
Alum of Howard U. and Barnard College’s 1st black graduate
“Queen of the Harlem Renaissance”
Subject of an Alice Walker essay
ZORA NEALE HURSTON
Author of “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
ZORA NEALE HURSTON
Playwright of “A Raisin In the Sun”
LORRAINE HANSBERRY
American poet
“Poet Laureate of Harlem”
Wrote for the Chicago Defender
Co-founded New York Suitcase Theater
Alum of Columbia U.
LANGSTON HUGHES
American poet
“The Negro Speaks of Rivers”
“Shakespeare in Harlem”
“The Weary Blues”
LANGSTON HUGHES
“What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?
[…]
Or does it explode?”
Identify the poem & poet
HARLEM
by LANGSTON HUGHES
American playwright born in Kansas
“Come Back, Little Sheba” (1950) title character is a dog
“Bus Stop” (1955) set at a restaurant
“The Dark at the Top of the Stairs” (1957) later a film with Preston & Lansbury
Won an Oscar for writing “Splendor in the Grass” (1961)
WILLIAM INGE
Pulitzer-winning 1953 Inge play
On Labor Day, drifter “Hal” attends title event
1955 film with William Holden
PICNIC
French novelist
“Le Pont de la riviere Kwai” (1952, later a 1957 film)
“La Planete des singes” (1963, later a 1968 film)
PIERRE BOULLE
1952 novel by Pierre Boulle
About British POWs in Burma during WWII
Later a 1957 film
LE PONT DE LA RIVIERE KWAI
THE BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER KWAI (novel)
THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (film)
1963 novel by Pierre Boulle
Earth ruled by chimps and gorillas
Later a 1968 film
LA PLANETE DES SINGES
PLANET OF THE APES
American author
“Clan of the Cave Bear” (1980), about Cro-Magnon girl Ayla living among Neanderthals
Also wrote “Mammoth Hunters” and the rest of the “Earth’s Children” series
JEAN M. AUEL
1980 novel by Jean M. Auel
About Cro-Magnon girl Ayla living among Neanderthals
First in the “Earth’s Children” series
CLAN OF THE CAVE BEAR
American author
“Outlander” (1991)
“Dragonfly in Amber”
DIANA GABALDON
1991 novel, first in a series by Diana Gabaldon
Followed by “Dragonfly in Amber”
Set in 18th century Scotland
About Claire & Jamie Fraser
Later a television series
OUTLANDER
South African author
“Cry, the Beloved Country” (1948)
ALAN PATON
1948 novel by Alan Paton
Set in South Africa
Pastor Stephen Kumalo looks for his son in Johannesburg
CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY
Peter Clemenza is the capo of this fictional crime family
THE CORLEONES
“I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
[…]
I, too, am America.”
- I, Too, by this poet
LANGSTON HUGHES
Ariadne Oliver is a character created and loosely based on this British mystery author
AGATHA CHRISTIE
American author
Dirk Pitt novels
“Raise the Titanic!” (1976)
National Underwater & Marine Agency (NUMA) leader
“Havana Storm” (2014)
CLIVE CUSSLER
American journalist
1887 expose on the Blackwell Asylum
1in 1890, flew around the world in 72 days
NELLIE BLY
American author (1925-2012)
“Myra Breckinridge” (1968)
“Burr” (1973)
“1876” (1976)
“Lincoln” (1984)
“Live From Golgotha”
GORE VIDAL
1968 novel by Gore Vidal
Later a 1970 film
Sequel “Myron”
MYRA BRECKINRIDGE
Singapore-born American author
“Crazy Rich Asians” (2013)
KEVIN KWAN
2013 novel by Kevin Kwan
About Rachel Chu & Nick Young
Followed by “China Rich Girlfriend” (2015) and “Rich People Problems” (2017)
CRAZY RICH ASIANS
American journalist & author
Civil War vet
“The Devil’s Dictionary” (1906)
“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”
Disappeared in Mexico 1913
AMBROSE BIERCE
Ambrose Bierce’s 1906 satirical lexicon
THE DEVIL’S DICTIONARY
Ambrose Bierce wrote of “An Occurrence” there
OWL CREEK BRIDGE
Named for its home Abbey in County Meath
Illuminated Latin manuscript of the 4 gospels
From around 800 C.E.
BOOK OF KELLS
Fictional creature from Hugh Lofting’s Doctor Dolittle stories
2 heads and no tail
PUSHMI-PULLYU
Poem or stanza of 4 lines
Especially associated with Nostradamus & Omar Khayyam
QUATRAIN
1973 Peter Shaffer play
Psychiatrist Martin Dysart
Patient Alan Strang is obsessed with horses, especially Nugget, and ends up blinding some
EQUUS
English playwright
Wrote mysteries with twin brother Anthony
“Equus” (1973)
“Amadeus” (1979 play, 1984 screenplay)
PETER SHAFFER
Unrhymed meter, usually iambic pentameter
Used in Shakespeare pays & in Milton’s “Paradise Lost”
BLANK VERSE
2009 play by Rajiv Joseph about the title animal in Iraq
BENGAL TIGER AT THE BAGHDAD ZOO
1978 play by Harold Pinter
About infidelity in a failing relationship
Occurs backwards
BETRAYAL
British playwright
2005 Nobel Literature Prize
“The Birthday Party” (1957)
“The Dumb Waiter (1959)
“Betrayal” (1978)
“The Last Tycoon” (1976) screenplay
“The French Lieutenant’s Woman” (1981) screenplay
HAROLD PINTER
John Milton’s 1671 epic sequel about Jesus
PARADISE REGAINED
Capital of Hell in Milton’s “Paradise Lost”
Meaning “all devils”
PANDEMONIUM
1667 epic poem in blank verse
“Of man’s 1st disobedience & the fruit…”
“Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.”
“All Hell broke loose.”
PARADISE LOST
1667 John Milton epic poem
Satan and his right hand man Beelzebub
Tree of Knowledge & Tree of Life
PARADISE LOST
“The Blind Poet”
Also called a “puritan poet”
Alum of Cambridge
Wrote a closet drama about the (also blind) “Samson Agonistes”
Wrote a sonnet “On his blindness” - “When I Consider How My Light is Spent”
Wrote sonnets to/about Cromwell
JOHN MILTON
Job of transcribing dictation, often using shorthand, as a court reporter may
STENOGRAPHY
STENOGRAPHER
Brazilian author
“O Alquimisto” or “The Alchemist” (1988)
PAULO COELHO
Jeffrey Eugenides’ 1993 novel about the Lisbon sisters & their deaths
Adapted by Sofia Coppola into a 1999 film starring Kirsten Dunst
THE VIRGIN SUICIDES
Jeffrey Eugenides’ Pulitzer-winning 2002 novel about the Greek & intersex Cal Stephanides
MIDDLESEX
American author
“The Virgin Suicides” (1993)
“Middlesex” (2002)
“The Marriage Plot” (2011)
JEFFREY EUGENIDES
Fictional Washington, DC detective & FBI liaison
Protagonist of “Along Came a Spider” (1993) & other novels by James Patterson
ALEX CROSS
They co-wrote “The President Is Missing” (2018) & “The President’s Daughter” (2021)
JAMES PATTERSON & BILL CLINTON
James Patterson’s 2012 novel about an animal uprising
Later a CBS series (2015-2017)
ZOO
American best-selling author
Alex Cross series
“Zoo” (2012)
The “I’m a Toys ‘R’ Us kid” jingle
JAMES PATTERSON
Thomas Hardy’s last novel (1895)
Title character is a stonemason with the last name “Fawley”
Originally titled “The Simpletons”
JUDE THE OBSCURE
1886 Thomas Hardy novel
About Michael Henchard, who holds the title position
THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE
Thomas Hardy’s 1878 novel
Characters include Clym Yeobright & Eustacia Vye
THE RETURN OF THE NATIVE
1874 Thomas Hardy novel
Bathsheba Everdene
2015 film
FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD
1891 Thomas Hardy novel
Title character is a country girl who “claims kin” with a rich family
Alec rapes her and she gives birth to “Sorrow”
Eventually she is arrested & dies
1979 Polanski film adaptation
TESS OF THE D’URBERVILLES
Victorian realist novelist (1840-1928)
Wrote about a semi-fictional “Wessex” in his novels and in “Wessex Poems & Other Verses”
“A Pair of Blue Eyes” (1873)
THOMAS HARDY
English writer 1881-1975
Creator of Bertie Wooster & his valet, Reginald Jeeves
P(ELHAM) G(RENVILLE) WODEHOUSE
American writer from Mississippi (1909-2001)
“Delta Wedding” (1946)
“The Optimist’s Daughter” (1972) - Pulitzer
“Why I Live at the P.O.”
“The Robber Bridegroom”
EUDORA WELTY
Swedish playwright
“Miss Julie”/”Froken Julie” (1888)
“Gustav Vasa”
(JOHAN) AUGUST STRINDBERG
1888 August Strindberg play
Title character is a count’s daughter who has an affair with a valet
MISS JULIE
(FROKEN JULIE)
1842 Robert Browning poem
Retells a German fairy tale about rats
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN
11th century Persian poet/astronomer/mathematician
Last name means “tentmaker” in Arabic
Wrote the “Rubaiyat”, a series of quatrains translated by Edward Fitzgerald
OMAR KHAYYAM
“A book of verses underneath the bough
A flask of wine, a loaf of bread and thou
Beside me singing in the wilderness
And wilderness is paradise now.”
-Name the poet & work
OMAR KHAYYAM’S “RUBAIYAT”
England’s 1st official Poet Laureate (1668)
Buried in poet’s corner
“All For Love” (1677) - about Antony & Cleopatra
“Alexander’s Feast” - “None but the brave deserve the fair”
“Here lies my wife, here let her lie,
Now she’s at rest, and so am I.”
JOHN DRYDEN
1970 book by Abbie Hoffman
Seems to advise criminality
STEAL THIS BOOK
Russian writer
Critic of Stalin, spent time in gulags
“One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” (1962)
“(In) the First Circle” (1968)
ALEKSANDR SOLZHENITSYN
Russian writer
Winner of 1970 Nobel for Literature
“Cancer Ward” (1966)
“The Gulag Archipelago” (1973)
Deported from USSR in 1974
ALEKSANDR SOLZHENITSYN
1962 novel by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Describes a man’s routine in a gulag
ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF IVAN DENISOVICH
1973 novel by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Published in Paris
Metaphor for prisons as islands
THE GULAG ARCHIPELAGO
Author of the 1969 memoir “Papillon”, which describes his escape from Devil’s Island
Later portrayed on film by Steve McQueen & Charlie Hunnam
HENRI CHARRIERE
1969 memoir by Henri Charriere
Describes his escape from Devil’s Island
Named for his chest tattoo of an insect
PAPILLON
Sri Lankan-born Canadian writer
“The English Patient” (1992)
MICHAEL ONDAATJE
1992 Michael Ondaatje novel
Set in 1945 Italy
Title refers to the badly burned (& actually Hungarian) Count Almasy
Nurse Hana reads to him
Adapted into a 1996 film
THE ENGLISH PATIENT
Creator of LA shamus Philip Marlowe
First novel - “The Big Sleep” (1939)
“The Long Goodbye” (1953) won an Edgar
RAYMOND CHANDLER
Raymond Chandler’s first novel (1939)
Features Philip Marlowe
Title is a euphemism for death
THE BIG SLEEP
Character created by Raymond Chandler
Private investigator or “shamus”
Portrayed by Humphrey Bogart in “The Big Sleep” (1946)
Also appears in “The Long Goodbye”
PHILIP MARLOWE
“Yearly” title of Charles C. Mann’s book “New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus”
1491
American author
“Red Dragon” (1981)
“Silence of the Lambs” (1988)
“Hannibal” (1999)
“Hannibal Rising” (2007)
THOMAS HARRIS
Fictional character
Psychiatrist
Created by Thomas Harris
Played by Brian Cox, Anthony Hopkins, Gaspard Ulliel, & Mads Mikkelsen
HANNIBAL LECTER
American writer
Creator of Boston detective Jane Rizzoli & medical examiner Maura Isles
“The Surgeon” (2001)
TESS GERRITSEN
Writer from Georgia
Recorded tales of Brer Fox, Brer Bear, etc. using the narrator “Uncle Remus” in 1881
JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS
Narrator of Joel Chandler Harris’ folk tales
Also appears in Disney’s Song of the South
UNCLE REMUS
American author
“Bel Canto” (2001)
“The Dutch House” (2019)
ANN PATCHETT
2001 Ann Patchett novel about opera & terrorism
Named for a singing style
BEL CANTO
1913 G.B. Shaw play
Phonetics prof. Henry Higgins teaches (& falls for) cockney flower girl Eliza Doolittle
Eliza ends up with Freddy
Inspired “My Fair Lady”
PYGMALION
Mark Twain story about a sack of gold leading to scandal in a small pure town
THE MAN THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG
Founded in Boston in 1857 by J.G. Whittier, H.B. Stowe, H.W. Longfellow, R.W. Emerson, & O.W. Holmes Sr.
1st editor - James Russell Lowell
THE ATLANTIC (MONTHLY)
1962 children’s book by Ezra Jack Keats
Young black American boy Peter explores the neighbourhood after a blizzard
THE SNOWY DAY
American feminist writer
“Backlash” (1991)
“Stiffed” (1999)
SUSAN FALUDI
American writer
Alum of Rice U., taught at Princeton
“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” (1966 short story)
“We Were the Mulvaneys” (1996)
JOYCE CAROL OATES
English writer
In WWI letters to his kids, created Dr. Dolittle (first published 1920)
HUGH LOFTING
Fictional character created by Hugh Lofting
Taught to speak by the parrot Polynesia
Also friends with the duck Dab-Dab, monkey Chee-Chee, pig Gub-Gub, and the pushmi-pullyu
Played by Rex Harrison, Eddie Murphy, & Robert Downey Jr.
DOCTOR JOHN DOLITTLE
American sportswriter & novelist
“The Poseidon Adventure” (1969)
“Thomasina” (1957) about a cat
“Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris” (1958)
PAUL GALLICO
1969 Paul Gallico novel about a capsized ocean liner
THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE
English poet & playwright
“The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus”
“Hero & Leander”
“Tamburlaine the Great”
“Edward the Second”
“Dido, Queen of Carthage”
Possibly a spy for Elizabeth I
Died mysteriously in 1593
CHRISTOPHER “KIT” MARLOWE
American novelist
“Election” (1998) about high schooler Tracy Flick (basis for the 1999 Witherspoon film)
“Little Children” (2004) about unfulfilled wife Sarah (basis for the 2006 Winslet film)
“The Leftovers” (2011) about the Rapture (basis for the 2014 HBO series)
TOM PEROTTA
Name the poet & work:
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece,
And the grandeur that was Rome.
TO HELEN
by EDGAR ALLAN POE
Bird referred to by Keats as “Light-winged dryad of the trees”
NIGHTINGALE
Name the poet & work:
Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove,
That Valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.
THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE
by CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
Childhood friend of Harper Lee
Basis of Dill Harris in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
TRUMAN CAPOTE
British MI6 agent, novelist, screenwriter, & critic
“The Third Man” (1949)
“Our Man In Havana” (1958) about a vacuum salesman & spy
“The End of the Affair” (1951)
“The Quiet American” (1955)
GRAHAM GREENE
