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Carpe Canem, or was It Cave Diem ?

Just click on any question to see the corresponding answer.

This is a Theme-based quiz. Questions are grouped by theme, with each answer serving as a clue to the theme.

THEME 0: MOVIE. 4 QUESTIONS.
1.When asked by friends how Kane's last words would become known if he died alone, Orson Welles thought for a long time. What did he tell them finally ?


2.In the credits of the Michael Curtiz film "This is the Army", adapted from an Irving Berlin musical, all civilian members of the cast were listed first. Then, the members of the US Armed Forces were listed. Who did this list start with ?


3.During the making of "Eyes Wide Shut", Kubrick and the screenplay writer Frederic Raphael had a debate about the family name of Tom Cruise's character. Raphael wanted him to be Jewish as in the original. But Kubrick insisted that he should be a "vanilla" American, without any details that would arouse any presumptions, a bit like _____________. This comment led to the choice of the family name of Tom Cruise's character. A bit like who ?


4.What's common to Betty Boop,Don Juan,Henry Fonda,Ingrid Bergman,John F.Kennedy and Judy Garland among others. The last name should give you a clue.


THEME:


At the end of each of Themes 1,2 and 3 one clue will be given which will lead to Theme 4 which is a personality.
THEME 1: PERSONALITY. 4 QUESTIONS.
1.Dune. The Bene Gesserit had a secret understanding with a sect on the planet Gammu. This society was supposed to have died out shortly after the Second Interspace Migrations. They kept to themselves and frowned on outbreeding. They were amused and sometimes dismayed by what they interpreted as the Bene Gesserit copying them. The Bene Gesserit breeding records, dominated by the female line to control the mating pattern, was supposed to have been adopted from them. What was this society?


2.He was a unique combination of middle-class intellectual and working-class reformer. Most of his writings have a strong autobiographical element.His experiences living in poverty colour A Clergyman's Daughter (1935). The novel attacks social injustice and ranges from the miseries and hypocrisies of the poor of middle-class background to the near-starvation of the slumdweller. For a period of time, he chose to experience a life of poverty, and lived as a tramp in England and Europe until the mid-1930's. He also had a brief career as a soldier. What was the work that he wrote based on this experience ?


3.In 1885, Freud went to Paris to study under Jean Martin Charcot, a famous neurologist. Charcot was working with patients who suffered from purely mental problems. Some of these people appeared to be blind or paralysed, but they actually had no physical defects. Charcot found that their physical symptoms could be relieved through hypnosis. Freud returned to Vienna in 1886 and began to work extensively with types of patients.What was the medical name given later for such illness ?


4. Hitchcock's statement that "Actors are cattle" raised a lot of hue and cry and many believe that this cost him the best film Oscar for "Rear Window". Later on he remarked,"I didn't say actors are cattle. What I said was, __________"?


THEME:


THEME 2: 5 QUESTIONS.
1.In Christopher Marlowe's "The Tragedy of Dr.Faustus", Faust alludes to a traditional Jewish name for the devil:Beelzebub, by calling Mephistopheles something. This was later to inspire the title of a book by a Nobel-prize winning author.Give me the title of the book.


2.What's common to the TV films "A Casualty of War","Pride and Extreme Prejudice", "Death has a bad reputation", "A Little Piece of Sunshine", "Just another secret" and "The Price of the Bride" ?


3.Known as the Man of a Thousand Faces, he was a master of early screen make-up techniques. A child of deaf-mute parents, he became a master of pantomime and understanding of people who were born different. He was famous for his horror roles. His son, who also became an actor, also became famous in the horror genre. Who ?


4.It rose to pre-eminence in the eighteenth century. After the Revolution it was restored to its leading position in Paris by Napoleon in the reforms of 1807. Claude Debussy says about it, "Everybody knows the _____, at least by reputation. It is with regret that I assure you it hasn't changed at all: for the sake of the passer-by who hasn't been warned, let me say that it looks like a railway station. But once you're inside you'll be more likely to mistake it for a Turkish bath." It is 17 storeys high and is supposed to have been built on top of a lake. What are we talking about ?


5.Who composed the music for the film "The Odessa File" ?


THEME:


THEME 3:
1.Workable.An important new genre in American film in the 1930's, Gangster films dramatized the violence and disorder that accompanied the illegal manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages during the prohibition era in the United States (1919-1933). There were two major films that created the gangster film genre. One was The Public Enemy (1931), directed by William Wellman. The other was directed by Howard Hawks and produced by Howard Hughes (of Hughes aircraft and RKO fame). The censors of the time thought that the film showed that a life of crime was too easy and that the gangster gets away with it all. So, a new ending was shot in which the gangster is arrested, tried and hanged. Still, the censors weren't happy. So, Howard Hawks abandoned the changes and simply released the film without censor approval. What was the film ?


2.In the 1700s groups of friends used to meet and, for several days, each man wrote the name of his lady love on a piece of paper and attached it prominently on his garments. What phrase originates from this?


3. His family descended from Sieur de Worcester who fought in Agincourt.He won a prize at Malvern for best collectiooon of wild flowers. Studied at Eton and Magdalen.Wrote for the magazine "Milady's Boudoir". He modelled for an advertising poster for soup. He was also an amateur Banjolele player. Who ?


4. Connect: Knight,Miller,Reeve,Cook,Lawyer,Sailor,Monk,Prioress,etc.


THEME:


THEME 4 ANSWER:


THEME 5: 10 QUESTIONS.
1. Joseph Nicephore Niepce invented the camera and took teh first permanent photograph in Paris in 1826. After hsi death, his later collaborator sold the invention to the French Govt. Niepce also created the combustion engine. Who was the collaborator ?


2.The tagline of this british film was "Spies! Playing the game of Love and Sudden Death". The story is about this young couple travelling on a train in continental europe who realise that a passenger seems to have been kidnapped from their train. It introduced two characters called Caldicott and Chatford, played by Naunton Wayne and Basil Radford, who went on to enact the same comic roles in many more films. Its director won the New York Film Critics Circle award for Best Director. Features such memorable quotes like "I'm about as popular as a dose of strychnine.".


3.Catherine of Braganza, wife of Charles II, brought Bombay to England as her dowry. What area of New York is named after her ?


4. Bombay families often bear names derived from ancestral professions. Hence the names Merchant, Engineer, Contractor ( coincidentally all cricketers) and Doctor. A mason is a Mistry and a banker is a Shroff. What is a shipbuilder ?


5.Cyrene to Aristaeus:"There is an old prophet named ____, who dwells in the sea and is a favourite of Neptune, whose herd of sea-calves he pastures. We nymphs hold him in great respect, for he is a learned sage and knows all things, past, present, and to come. He can tell you, my son, the cause of the mortality among your bees and how you may remedy it. But he will not do it voluntarily, however you may entreat him. You must compel him by force. If you seize him and chain him, he will answer your questions in order to get released, for he cannot by all his arts get away if you hold fast the chains. I will carry you to his cave, where he comes at noon to take his midday repose. Then you may easily secure him." Who is she talking about ?


6.What is Greek for "light" ?


7.What is Greek for "goat song" ?


8.Fill in the blank. " How can there be a place called Tequila. It's like saying whisky comes from Whisky, or gin is made in Gin. Is the Vodka a river in Russia ? Do they make rum in Rum ? And heroin comes from heroes, and crack from _______" ?


9.Tantalus, in spite of his thirst, stopped for a moment his efforts for water, Ixion's wheel stood still, the vulture ceased to tear the giant's liver, the daughters of Danaus rested from their task of drawing water in a sieve, and Sisyphus sat on his rock to listen. Then for the first time, it is said, the cheeks of the Furies were wet with tears. What was the occasion ?


10.It was launched by Germany against its enemies in WWII and was a ballistic missile of relatively short range, but it foreshadowed the development of a larger liquid propellant rocket engine that was the predecessor of more powerful rocket engines developed for modern space flight. Much of the basic theory used by German scientists in the development of the engine for it came from experimentation by Dr. Robert Goddard in the United States.Post-war American liquid fueled rocket engines evolved directly from the German engine that powered this weapon. Thus it was that the engines eventually used in U.S. Air Force space boosters owed much to it. In February 1949 an American WAC Corporal second stage rocket carried atop a modified booster sent a payload 250 miles into the vacuum of space on a short suborbital flight. Mankind had taken its first real step into space. What was the weapon ?


THEME:


At the end of each of themes 6,7,8 and 9 one clue will be given to THEME 10. I will not say what THEME 10 is at this point.
THEME 6. 10 QUESTIONS.
1. Fill in this quote by Alexander Pope. "Nature and nature's laws lay hid in night: God said,"_________" and all was light."


2.There is some dispute over his real birth date. 23 January 1899 is the currently accepted date, however his official New York City birth certificate is dated 25 December 1899. Some believe this was made up simply to romanticise his image. While serving in the US Navy in WW1, his face was injured in the shelling of the Leviathan; he ended up having a partial paralysis. Named one of his children Leslie to show his gratitude to Leslie Howard who got him his big break in Petrified Forest, The (1936). One of his quotes "The trouble with the world is that it's always one drink behind." Who ?


3.Complete: Bernard Lee(I), Robert Brown(I), Edward Fox, _________.


4.Tolkien.When Bilbo Baggins and the Dwarves set out for Mirkwood from Beorn's house, he provided them with a lot of food-nuts, flour, dried fruits,etc. He also provided them with special twice-baked cakes that would keep a long time and on a little of which they could march far. The making of these was one of his secrets but honey was in them, they were good to eat and made one thirsty. How do we better know these cakes ?


5. Jack Nicholson's first directorial venture was a film called "The Two Jakes", starring him and Harvey Keitel. What was this film a sequel to ?


6.A quote from the Tempest:
" Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are ---------
-----------------; and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
Act iv. Sc. 1.


7. On the last day of filming of a picture, he said "Christ, I'm glad this picture's finished. She damn near gave me a heart attack." Who was talking about whom ?


8.The book "Cat's Cradle" by Kurt Vonnegut begins with a take-off on Herman Melville. What is the first line ?


9.The publication of the collection of poems "Barrack-Room Ballads" written in Cockney dialect, brought Rudyard Kipling fame. The second half of this book describes the joys and troubles of a Private from his days as an army recruit to his retirement from the military. The book was the first in English literature to portray the heroism and quiet devotion to duty of the ordinary British soldier. The Ballads include such famous poems as "Danny Deever," "Fuzzy-Wuzzy," "Gunga Din," and "The Road to Mandalay." What was the name of the private.


10.The reclusive novelist B. Traven, who wrote the book on which this film was based, was asked if he would like to visit the set during location shooting. Traven demurred, and said he would be sending an associate instead. It later turned out that the associate was actually Traven himself, using a pseudonym. This film is also responsible for introducing the immortal line "we don't need no stinkin' badges" which has since been used in many westerns. Name the film.


THEME:


THEME 7: PERSONALITY. 4 QUESTIONS.
1."In the course of preparing myself...I realized afresh that I hate Churchill and all of his kind. I hate them virulently. They have stalked down the corridors of endless power all through history.... What man of sanity would say on hearing of the atrocities committed by the Japanese against British and Anzac prisoners of war, "We shall wipe them out, everyone of them,men, women, and children. There shall not be a Japanese left on the face of the earth"? Such simple-minded cravings for revenge leave me with a horrified but reluctant awe for such single-minded and merciless ferocity." Who's the speaker ?


2.Originally a bee-keeper by profession. He led the first mechanised expedition to the South Pole. Also led other expeditions to remote corners of the earth. Later on in life, he became an active environmentalist and also devoted his energies to humanitarian efforts on behalf of the Nepalese people. Wrote an autobiography "Nothing Venture,Nothing Win". Wife and daughter died in an aircrash in 1975. Who?


3. In Macbeth, Lady Macbeth beseeches the spirits to "stop up the access and passage to remorse, that no _______ visitings of nature shake my fell purpose..."The original Latin root of this word meant to prick or to sting, but did not have an adjective form. Shakespeare gave it a Latinised ending and ended up coining this word. What word ?


4.The chapters of this book include "Calypso","Sirens","Cyclops" and "Circe". Name the book and the author and connect to Cornell University.


THEME:


THEME 8: PERSONALITY. 5 QUESTIONS.
1. Born in 1749 in Berkeley, Gloucestershire. Played the violin in a musical club, wrote light verse and made many observations as a naturalist, particularly on the nesting habits of the cuckoo and on bird migration. He shot to fame in 1796 thanks in part to a young dairymaid called Sarah Nelmes. Who ?


2.The famous theatre at Bayreuth was constructed by Richard Wagner in order to give a complete performance of the Ring trilogy. After hsi death, his son became the director of the theatre in 1909. Later on, his grandson became the director and revolutionised the production of operas. Irrelevant. What was the son's (first :-) ) name ?


3. The current sense of this word is derived ultimately from the title of A.T.Baumgarten's "______" in 1750 which treats of the criticism of taste considered as a philosophical theory. The word was used occasionally before 1800 in the Kantian sense "pertaining to the philosophy of sensuous perception". What is the word ?


4.Paracelsus gave this name for a medicament for which he gives a pretended prescription of costly ingredients. But, it was suspeccted to contain one major ingredient; now, all preparations containing this ingredient are given this name.Hint: comix. What is the name ?


5.Born in England, educated at Cambridge. Went on a walking tour of France and Switzerland. In France, he became a Republican, had an affair with a French girl and had a daughter by her. Returned to England and settled down in Dorset with his sister. Later married. Most well-known for his posthumously published autobiography "The Prelude". Who ?


THEME:


THEME 9. 4 QUESTIONS.
1. What did John Lennon claim to have invented in the Beatles song "I feel fine"?


2. "The story of the Jews in America begins with Christopher Columbus. On August 2, 1492, more than 300,000 Jews were expelled from Spain and on August 3, the next day, Columbus set sail for the west,taking a group of Jews with him."This is the first paragraph of a book titled "The International Jew, The World's Foremost Problem". Who was the author ?


3. In this computer game,you control an elite NATO counter-terrorist rapid-response team based in England. You attend briefings, plan strategy and select a team of 8 individuals. After training the team, you use a 3-D map to plan the mission. In the assault phase, you infiltrate seized buildings, disarm explosives, rescue hostages, etc. It is one of the most detailed and realistic action games ever made. Many of the scenarios are based on real-world events and the character backgrounds closely follow the careers of known counterterrorist operatives. Name the game and its creator.


4. There is only one thing that can travel faster than light. The Hingefreel people of Arkintoofle Minor tried to build spaceships that were powered by this but they didn't work very well and were extremely unwelcome wherever they went. What were they powered by ?


THEME:


THEME 10: Four clues have already been given. There is an extra question which is also part of this theme.
5. What is Italian for "point" or "edge" ?


THEME 10: