The Debatable Land: The Toughest Quiz You'll Tackle All Year

January 06, 2009

The Toughest Quiz You'll Tackle All Year

Lost amidst my Christmas hiatus was the annual brain-hurting attempt at the King William's College (Isle of Man) end of year quiz, thoughtfully published, as always, by those nice people at the Guardian. It is almost certainly the hardest quiz you'll attempt this year. Find the entire list of questions (all 180 of them!) here. Just for fun, here's a sample of what it's like:

9) Journeying on what, between which termini, might one's thoughts
turn to:
1. sleepwalking?
2. elliptical orbits?
3. the quintessential libertine?
4. a soldier without a passport?
5. the founding father of the EU?
6. the royal prisoner of Sönderborg?
7. Judith and three mute wives?
8. clothed and naked versions?
9. the mount of Bellerophon?
10. melting clocks?

Have a crack at the entire thing (without Googling!) and let me know how you get on. Me? I need more pondering time before I admit defeat.

6 Jan 2009 01:16:22 | Trivia

8 Comments

I suspect this is somewhat like crossword puzzles; once you know how to decipher many of the references, or get the link between the clues in the section, things become somewhat simpler (though only somewhat!). Section 13 is clearly US Presidents, though I guess you'd figured that out already. And I know the quote from Numbers, too, though I'm not sure that's particularly helpful in terms of the wider section (the questions seem to be linked rather than the answers there).

Posted by: Ken | January 06, 2009 at 02:18 PM

Dr Pat Cullen, does like to keep them tough but I'll throw in King Christian 11 ( 1532 ) for the royal prisoner of Sonderborg and Persistence of Memory, Salvador Dali for the melting clocks.
" To know where you can find anything is, after all, the greatest part of erudition "

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