What word, extended from a more popular term, refers to a fictional book of between 20,000 and 50,000 words? Novella
Who wrote the famous 1855 poem The Charge of the Light Brigade? Lord Alfred Tennyson (1809-92)
In 1960 the UK publishing ban was lifted on what 1928 book? Lady Chatterley's Lover (by D H Lawrence)
In bookmaking how many times would an quarto sheet be folded? Twice (to create four leaves)
Who wrote the seminal 1936 self-help book How to Win Friends and Influence People? Dale Carnegie
Who in 1450 invented movable type, thus revolutionising printing? Johannes Gutenberg
Which Polish-born naturalised British novelist's real surname was Korzeniowski? Joseph Conrad (1857-1924, full name Jozef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski)
Which short-lived dramatist is regarded as the first great exponent of blank verse? Christopher Marlowe (1564-93 - Blank verse traditionally is unrhymed, comprising ten syllables per line, stressing every second syllable.)
Who wrote the maxim 'Cogito, ergo sum' (I think, therefore I am)? René Descartes (1596-1650, French philosopher and mathematician, in his work Discours de la Méthode, 1637.)
Who was the youngest of the three Brontë writing sisters? Anne Brontë (1820-49 - other sisters were Emily, 1818-48, and Charlotte, 1816-55, plus a brother, Branwell, 1817-48. The two oldest sisters, Maria and Elizabeth died in childhood.)
What is the Old English heroic poem, surviving in a single copy dated around the year 1000, featuring its eponymous 6th century warrior from Geatland in Sweden? Beowulf
What relatively modern school of philosophy, popular in literature since the mid 1900s, broadly embodies the notion of individual freedom of choice within a disorded and inexplicable universe? Existentialism
What was the pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson? Lewis Carroll (1832-98)
Who wrote Dr Zhivago? Boris Leonidovich Pasternak (1890-1960)
What term and type of comedy is derived from the French word for stuffing? Farce or farcical (from the French farcir, to stuff, based on analogy between stuffing in cookery and the insertion of frivolous material into medieval plays.)
What term originally meaning 'storehouse' referred, and still refers, to a periodical of various content and imaginative writing? Magazine
Who wrote the significant scientific book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, published in 1687? Isaac Newton (1642-1727)
What 16th century establishment in London's Bread Street was a notable writers' haunt? The Mermaid Tavern
Who wrote the 1845 poem The Pied Piper of Hamelin? Robert Browning (1812-89)
Which American poet and humanist wrote and continually revised a collection of poems called Leaves of Grass? Walt Whitman (1819-92 - the title is apparently a self-effacing pun, since grass was publishing slang for work of little value, and leaves are pages.)