A quiz on Shakespeare 400 years in the making
On Saturday we celebrate the birthday of the world’s most revered playwright — and mark the 400th anniversary of his death on the same day. How much do you know about the bard? Try our quiz,
1. Which of the following musicals contains an entire number that sets a famous Shakespeare monologue to music? a. West Side Story b. Hair c. The Lion King d. The Boys From Syracuse e. A Chorus Line
2. Which of the following book/ play titles is NOT taken from a Shakespeare play? a. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen b. The Mousetrap by Agatha Christie c. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner d. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley e. In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
3. Which of the following phrases was NOT created by Shakespeare? a. “clothes make the man” b. “the be all and end all” c. “what the dickens” d. “synergies were optimized” e. “it was Greek to me”
4. FIRST LINES: Name the Shakespeare play that begins with ... a. “If music be the food of love, play on ...” b. “Two households, both alike in dignity/In fair Verona, where we lay our scene ...” c. “Now is the winter of our discontent/Made glorious summer by this sun of York.” d. “Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour/Draws on apace ...” e. “When shall we three meet again/ In thunder, lightning, or in rain?” f. “I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.” g. “O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend/ The brightest heaven of invention ...”
5. Which of the following Shakespeare plays does not involve a shipwreck? a. Twelfth Night b. The Tempest c. Pericles d. Macbeth e. The Comedy of Errors
6. To avoid disastrous luck, according to theatre lore, which Shakespeare play should never be named aloud within a theatre? a. Coriolanus b. Pericles c. Macbeth d. Much Ado About Nothing
7. Which of the following Shakespeare plays has never been produced by Edmonton’s Freewill Shakespeare Festival? a. Titus Andronicus b. Much Ado About Nothing c. All’s Well That Ends Well d. The Merry Wives of Windsor
8. Shakespeare was playwright-in-residence, for most of his career, at which theatre company? a. The Lord Chamberlain’s Men b. The Stratford Players c. The Theatre Royal d. The Drury Lane New Play Festival
9. Shakespeare is associated, most famously, with the Globe Theatre in the London entertainment district south of the Thames. But what was the first London theatre where Shakespeare’s company put on plays? a. The Rose b. The Theatre c. Blackfriars Theatre d. The Wintergarden
10. The first Globe Theatre burned to the ground in 1613. What was the cause of the blaze? a. Welsh terrorists protesting a characterization in Henry IV Part One b. The Great Fire of London c. Groundlings smoking d. Sparks from the kitchen at the George Tavern next door e. A stage cannon igniting the thatched roof during a performance of Henry VIII
11. In which Shakespeare play do the following events occur? a. A queen is served a meat pie into which her sons have been baked b. A forest moves c. A man’s eyes are gouged out d. Two pairs of lovers get rematched when magic juice from a flower gets sprinkled on their eyelids.
12. Sonnets, sometimes deliberately comical, stilted ones, get written by characters in the course of Shakespeare plays. How many stand-alone sonnets did Shakespeare write? a. 226 b. more than 1,000 c. 11 d. 154
13. On the theory that “the man from Stratford” — an actor from the sticks who didn’t go to university — couldn’t possibly have written the Shakespeare plays, scholars and miscellaneous cranks have put forward a variety of names as alternative candidates. Which of the following names isn’t one? a. Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford b. Francis Bacon c. Ben Jonson d. Sir Walter Raleigh e. William Stanley, Earl of Derby
14. Which Shakespeare character said ... a. “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” b. “all the world’s a stage ...” c. “what’s done is done ...” d. “once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more ...” e. “we are such stuff as dreams are made on ...” f. “but soft! what light through yonder window breaks?”
15. Which Shakespeare play contains the following plot devices? a. three caskets (one gold, one silver, one lead), a pound of flesh, 3,000 ducats b. two sets of twins with the same name c. a bracelet, a trunk, a tranquillizing potion, a headless corpse d. yellow stockings, cross-gartered e. a bear
16. As in so many things, Shakespeare was ahead of his time in gender mobility. Which of the following Shakespeare plays involves a woman disguising herself as a man? a. Cymbeline b. Twelfth Night c. As You Like It d. The Merchant of Venice e. Two Gentlemen of Verona
17. Shakespeare was the son of ... a. a thatch-roofer b. a violin-maker c. a boat-builder d. a glover
18. In Shakespeare’s will he famously left which of the following to his wife? a. a box of manuscripts for a limerick series b. his second-best bed c. his pen set d. the script for a now-lost play called Cardenio e. his broadsword with the special hilt inscribed by Queen Elizabeth I
BONUS QUESTIONS
19. Which famous author also died on April 23, 1616?
20. The Free Will Players launched 27 summers ago with which Shakespeare play?
21. What’s the name of the play-within-a-play that the “rude mechanicals,” led by Bottom the Weaver, put on at court in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?
1. b (What A Piece Of Work Is Man)
2. a
3. d.
4. (a) Twelfth Night, (b) Romeo and Juliet, (c) Richard III, (d) A Midsummer’s Night Dream, (e) Macbeth, (f) King Lear, (g) Henry V.
5. d
6.c
7. c
8. a
9. b
10. e
11. (a) Titus Andronicus, (b) Macbeth, (c) King Lear, (d) A Midsummer Night’s Dream 12. d
13. c
14. (a) Hamlet, (b) Jaques, (c) Lady Macbeth, (d) Henry V, (e) Prospero, (f) Romeo
15. (a) The Merchant of Venice, (b) The Comedy of Errors, (c) Cymbeline, (d) Twelfth Night, (e) The Winter’s Tale
16. all
17. d
18. b
19. Cervantes
20. The Comedy of Errors
21. Pyramus and Thisbe