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.

[phoenixxx]

As thorough as ever Ray the Grey, well done. Battles 1 may be Billy Prior as the fictional hero but surely the answer must be Pat Barker?
Pictures 4 and 5 are sound responses; I have also checked out Bodily Oddities 4 and 5, Fruit 1 and 2, Trains 3, Aeroplanes 3 and Battles 2 and 3.

[Eslite]

Agree with unlikelihood of Gide for Trains 4. Pendolino tilting trains only date from 1960s onwards, and "under the Apennines" suggests a tunnel as the murder (?) location.

[Crosswit]

Phew! Working on this now for 4 days solid and still don't have all the answers!
Fruit 4 Snow White seems a bit too obvious to me to be the answer and surely if it is Snow White then wouldn't the answer be The Wicked Queen. Any other suggestions for this one?
Trains 1 Looks like it could be from Cabal/Dibdin but it is the magistrate who is thrown from a train. Anyone know his name? Going to library today to check but can anyone beat me to it?
Criminals 4 also not sure of this one - had no idea there were so many novels with highwaymen!

[kamhlaba]

Hi
Fruit 4
I think I've found a literature alternative to Snow White - the poem A Poison Tree in William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience

[Brookline]

Just to confirm that Pictures 2 is definitely Norman Lewis - the photo is, as someone suggested, in Julian Evans' biography of Lewis, Semi-Invisible Man.

Another tentative suggestion for Madhouses 2: the American poet Hart Crane wrote a long poem called The Bridge, made up of several named sections. One of these is 'The Tunnel', which is based in the New York subway. Although it's not explicitly a 'madhouse', its inhabitants (including the ghost of Edgar Allan Poe) are pretty off the wall and he paints a bleak, Stygian view of 'life' below ground.
Here's the Url for the poem if anyone is inspired!
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.h tml?id=172034

[Ray The Grey]

I am still sure it is the Rake's Progress.

[goodfriday]

Is Trains 1 Carker from Dombey & Son??

[goodfriday]

Ha! Yes, it IS Carker. I thought it likely to be Victorian if it was trains and then I suddenly remembered the ghastly Carker. Must be thanks to that extra tasty glass of rioja I've just finished. Anyone interested might like to look up 'Rob the Grinder Loses his Place', Chapter 55.

[LG123]

Looking at where we are up to, I think the only one we are not very sure about is Trains 4 (pendolino/Apennines). Does everyone agree?

[phoenixxx]

Yes I think that's all. If anyone has any ideas or even vague thoughts please add them and I will check what I can. Did you have any luck checking Dibden, Crosswit?

[Ray The Grey]

The answer is definitely Cabal by Michael Dibdin - I checked it today. It is in Chapter 6 where Antonio Simonelli is thrown from a "pendulum" style train. The construction of the tunnel under the Apennines is described shortly before the incident and the fact it is in the tunnel makes the investigation more difficult.

I prefer the Blake answer for Fruit 4 - "fell foul of " implies death, which doesn't happen with Snow White - I think they would find it hard to discount the Snow White answer though (FRUIT 4).

Definitely James Carker for Trains 1 - matches exactly - I felt uneasy about the would-be seducer for Anna K. Great job goodfriday, it should have clicked with me, but I am obviously not drinking enough rioja!

[phoenixxx]

An amazingly quick solution - well done everyone. I expect The Sunday Times will mess up the answers/ winners in some way again but good luck to those of you who send off your responses.

If one of our contributors wins it would be nice to hear from you. Good luck and hope to be in touch next year.

[LG123]

Well done everyone, and good luck

[Crosswit]

Sorry Pheonix, Ray beat me to the answer to Trains 1 because my library didn't have a copy of Cabal! Well done Ray!
I am still unsure of Criminals 4 (the philandering highwayman) although I saw Captain MacHeath was suggested in a previous post. Is this the right answer or have I missed something? Please help.

[phoenixxx]

I am going with Captain Macheath

[goodfriday]

You have got so many of these answers right, Ray the Grey, that you obviously don't need the rioja to the same extent as this lesser mortal. And you're right about it being James Carker. There's a Carker brother in the book too, so we have to be clear about James!

What a great effort this year (and no sabotage by grumpy people). I shall definitely submit an entry. Many thanks, all.

[maxwellmarsh]

So who do we think for Madhouses 2?

I'm unsure about Plath or the Rake's Progress

[kamhlaba]

Madhouses 2
Maud:A monodrama by Alfred Lord Tennyson is definitely a poem and it has a section below pavement level where someone goes mad and thinks they are dead or among other mad people ! What do you think ?

[monaghan]

Been away and only just go into Quiz - I am impressed! I am leaning towards Maud for Madhouses 2 particularly as the Q states ' has a section'. It's the bit that starts Dead, Long Dead, Long dead. Apologies if this has already been discussedand dismissed!

[kennypilot]

Two things which make the Tennyson unlikely; first we already have a Tennyson and secondly the dead long dead bit is more about a grave than a madhouse. I know it says ....is enough to drive one mad, but I am not sure that that then turns the grave into a madhouse. Subterranean it certainly is. I don't think the Auden is quite right either. Let's keep searching!