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Literature and Language

17 practice questions, each with the answer and an explanation.

Practise Literature and Language now

Random questions from this topic, one at a time. You see the answer and the explanation straight after each one.

All 17 questions

  1. Which playwright wrote the tragedies Hamlet, Othello, King Lear and Macbeth?
  2. Which poet wrote 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud', also known as 'Daffodils', first published in 1807?
  3. Which writer, known for her 66 detective novels and the best-selling novelist of all time, created the detective Miss Marple?
  4. Which author is best known for the Discworld series of 41 comic fantasy novels published between 1983 and 2015?
  5. Which Celtic language of the Brittonic subgroup is spoken natively in Wales?
  6. Which writer created the character Ebenezer Scrooge?
  7. Which Scottish novelist, born in Edinburgh in 1850, wrote Treasure Island and Kidnapped?
  8. Which writer is the author of the novel Frankenstein, published in 1818?
  9. Which epic poem survives in a single copy in the manuscript known as the Nowell Codex and tells of a hero who helps King Hrothgar against the monster Grendel?
  10. Which author wrote The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, set in Middle-earth?
  11. Which Scottish author created Peter Pan, the boy who refuses to grow up?
  12. Which famous playwright's theatre, rebuilt in 1997, stands on the south bank of the Thames?
  13. Which Welsh poet wrote the villanelle 'Do not go gentle into that good night', first published in 1951?
  14. Which dystopian novel by George Orwell, published on 8 June 1949, is led by a dictatorial leader called Big Brother?
  15. Which English novelist wrote Middlemarch, published in 1871 to 1872?
  16. Which poet wrote the 1854 narrative poem 'The Charge of the Light Brigade' about the Battle of Balaclava?
  17. Who was appointed Poet Laureate on 1 May 1999, following the death of Ted Hughes?

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