BBC Radio 4 Brain of Britain Ultimate Quiz Book. Russell Davies

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      31. If all of the characters in the Bible were listed alphabetically, who would come first?

      32. In the BBC television situation comedy Yes Minister, by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, to which fictional government department was Jim Hacker first appointed a Minister?

      33. Which popular grape variety is used to produce the wines of Chablis?

      34. Which humorous artist and musician often used to sign his name with a trademark signature in which the double ‘f’ in his surname was replaced by two treble clefs?

      35. ‘It’s being so cheerful as keeps me going’ was the catchphrase of the character Mona Lott, in which classic radio comedy show popular in the 1940s?

      36. Which two-word phrase, indicating the tendency of writers and artists to ascribe human emotions and sympathies to nature, was coined by John Ruskin in the third volume of his work Modern Painters?

      37. Which Spanish city has a name that literally means ‘pomegranate’?

      38. What’s the name of the unfeasibly articulate and scheming toddler at the centre of the cartoon series Family Guy?

      39. What name describes a mechanical model, usually clockwork, representing the motions of the planets around the sun, an example having been depicted in a famous 18th century painting by Joseph Wright of Derby?

      40. Which American woman, who escaped from slavery in Maryland in the 1840s, is remembered for helping over 300 Southern slaves to freedom via the so-called ‘Underground Railroad’ of safe-houses?

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Quiz 20

      1. Robert Fitzroy, who commanded HMS Beagle on which Charles Darwin sailed as the ship’s naturalist, served from 1843 as the governor of which British colony?

      2. Which flower, referred to as ‘gillyflower’ in works by Shakespeare and Chaucer, was once used as a treatment for fevers and is now the symbol for Mothering Sunday?

      3. ‘Le Freak’ was one of the best-known songs of which American group of the disco era, led by musicians Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards?

      4. Which annual publication that first appeared in 1864 has been edited over the years by Charles Pardon, John Woodcock and Matthew Engel, among others, and featured an entry on the trial of Charles I in its first edition?

      5. What’s the name of the mythological snake, also sometimes called a cockatrice, an example of which is killed by Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets?

      6. Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax are protozoan parasites that cause which disease, most common in the tropics and subtropics?

      7. Which jazz trumpeter was the subject of the 1988 film documentary Let’s Get Lost, released the year of his death?

      8. In 1844, the architects Eugène Viollet-le-Duc and Jean-Baptiste Lassus were given the job of restoring which famous building?

      9. Mount Toubkal, rising to 13,670 feet or 4,167 metres, is the highest peak of which mountain range?

      10. Which team sport, that can be played indoors or outdoors, was devised by William Morgan in 1895, supposedly for middle-aged men who found basketball too vigorous?

      11. Many German princes were known as Electors, such as Elector of Hanover – a title that referred to what special privilege or duty?

      12. In which English county is the prehistoric monument known as the Rollright Stones?

      13. Harald, son of Gorm the Old, who was King of Denmark in the 10th century, was known by what surname?

      14. If a painting is described as a ‘tondo’, what shape must it be?

      15. Which public-school-educated policeman, who made his debut on radio, also appeared in the Eagle comic during the 1950s?

      16. A Möbius strip is a band or ribbon with only one face. What name is given to a bottle which is formed by passing the neck through the side to join a hole in the base, thus effectively creating a single side with neither an inside or an outside?

      17. Which item of food is thought to have been first displayed in England in the London shop window of Thomas Johnson on 10th April 1633?

      18. The names of which two signatories are generally used to identify the manifesto issued in London in July 1955, calling for scientists of the world to address together the problems of nuclear proliferation?

      19. In which TV series of the 1980s – set ‘20 minutes into the future’ – did the seriously injured investigative reporter Edison Carter have a copy of his mind downloaded onto a computer?

      20. Maud Gonne was a muse to which poet and visionary writer, his love for her inspiring some of his best known works?

      21. What is the name of the 264m tall volcanic neck in Wyoming in the USA, consisting of solidified lava, which was prominently featured in the Steven Spielberg film Close Encounters of the Third Kind?

      22. What name, derived from the Hebrew meaning ‘formless thing’ or ‘shapeless mass’, is given in Jewish legend to an artificially created life being brought to life by supernatural means, and is also the title of a 20th century Gothic novel by Gustav Meyrinck?

      23. Who commanded the joint French and Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar?

      24. What is the English alternative name for the Ruwenzori mountain range in East Africa?

      25. Derived from an old Norse word, a Cleg is another name for which insect?

      26. The Guardian’s obituary of the film director Irvin Kershner, who died in November 2010, begins with the following sentence: ‘Chosen to direct [X], he turned in one of the best sequels – and highest box-office earners – of all time’. Which film title have we left out?

      27. From Fred Perry in 1936 until 1997, no British male tennis player had reached a Grand Slam singles final. Which player broke that sixty-one-year drought?

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