CharlesMoslonka/trivia_qa_rc_wikipedia huggingface dataset:
Question: What South African island was used as a gaol for political prisoners while the country was under the policy of apartheid?
Answer: robben island
Question: What burning-liquid weapon was used by the Byzantine Greeks to great effect as it could continue burning even on water?
Answer: greek fire
Question: What weapon do many historians call 'the machine gun of the Middle Ages'?
Answer: longbow
Question: What two countries formed in 1993 as a result of what is known as the 'Velvet Divorce'?
Answer: czech republic and slovakia
Question: The Battle of Austerlitz, one of Napoleon's greatest victories is also known by what name that references Emperor Francis and the Russian Czar along with Napoleon himself?
Answer: battle of three emperors
Question: The Pulitzer-nominated 1979 book The Madwoman in the Attic which examines Victorian literature from a feminist perspective takes its title from a plot point of what 1847 novel?
Answer: charlotte brontë s jane eyre
Question: Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky a current-day husband and wife team are known for what type of contribution to literature?
Answer: translations
Question: Captain George Pollard, Jr., who inspired an all-time great 1851 novel, was the captain of Essex that was attacked and sunk by what?
Answer: sperm whale
Question: Who is the popular author who served as Chancellor of Moratuwa University in Sri Lanka from 1979 to 2002?
Answer: arthur c clarke
Question: According to a 1864 adventure novel, Saknussemm's Corridor in an extinct volcano in Iceland is the place to start if you seek to go where?
Answer: center of earth
Question: American poet Dixon Lanier Merritt's well-known limerick is about what bird?
Answer: pelican
Question: Algernon Blackwood's 1907 story, called by H. P. Lovecraft as the "finest supernatural tale in English literature" is titled after what type of trees? (hint: cricket)
Answer: willows
Question: In which Somerset Maugham's short-story does missionary Alfred Davidson try to reform a prostitute but ultimately succumbs to her charm?
Answer: rain
Question: The name of what literary swashbuckler is the answer to the final question in the Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire?
Answer: aramis
Question: Which prolific author created a men-only dining group called The Black Widowers for a series of mystery stories?
Answer: isaac asimov
Question: A 1978 contemplative travel book of Peter Matthiessen concerned him tracking what elusive creature of the Himalayas?
Answer: snow leopard
Question: A 1986 book on the pivotal role of six Cold War diplomats including Dean Acheson and George Kennan had what title evoking a certain Biblical trio?
Answer: wise men
Question: Just as Edward Bulwer-Lytton is associated with bombastic writing, what is the similarly famous poem of William McGonagall?
Answer: tay bridge disaster
Question: In Alan Moore's graphic novel V for Vendetta the anarchist wears a mask of which real-life person?
Answer: guy fawkes
Question: The award winning 2005 children's book And Tango Makes Three has been subject to much controversy as it was seen to be highlighting what behavior in the animal kingdom?
Answer: homosexuality
Question: Whose interview in Life magazine is said to have led to an upsurge in the sales of James Bond books? After a private screening of Dr. No, he also reportedly said "I wish I had had James Bond on my staff."
Answer: jfk
Question: In technical terms, the unforgettable Jeeves of P. G. Wodehouse is a valet and not a butler. Why?
Answer: he serves man and not household
Question: Polydactyl cats (born with more than the usual number of toes) are associated with which writer who was known for his love for them?
Answer: ernest hemingway
Question: What sonnet of Irish poet Seamus Heaney, a tribute to a long-running bulletin from BBC, starts as "Dogger, Rockall, Malin, Irish Sea"?
Answer: shipping forecast
Question: What is the name of the castle in Mervyn Peake's series of fantasy novels that has now come to mean any sprawling complex?
Answer: gormenghast
Question: Chekov's play Three Sisters is said to have been inspired by which real life siblings?
Answer: brontë sisters
Question: Which writer wrote the introduction for Robert Frank's influential photography book The Americans (1958) that contained images from Frank's travels across the US?
Answer: jack kerouac
Question: In Strega Nona by Tomie dePaola, the children's tale of magic gone awry, a town in Italy is buried in an avalanche of what?
Answer: pasta
Question: What 1904 story by M. R. James in which the protagonist finds an antique artifact with undesirable consequences gets its ominously inviting title from a 1793 Robert Burns poem/song?
Answer: oh whistle and i ll come to you my lad
Question: A controversial 1994 book by psychologist Richard J. Herrnstein whose premise is that genes and environment are predictors of intelligence is titled after what statistical function?
Answer: bell curve
Question: During the Siege of Sarajevo in the 90s, Susan Sontag directed what play in a candlelit theater symbolizing the city's absurd anticipation of western intervention?
Answer: samuel beckett s waiting for godot
Question: What is the better known nickname of Greg Heffley whose hilarious memoirs are now a hit book franchise?
Answer: wimpy kid
Question: The global think tank that attracted considerable attention with its 1972 publication of The Limits of Growth is called 'The Club of' what European city?
Answer: rome
Question: What 1899 poem of Rudyard Kipling whose racist title alludes to Western aspirations to dominate the developing world was written after the American colonization of the Philippines?
Answer: white man s burden
Question: The 5th Wave cartoons by Rich Tennant are interspersed throughout the books of what reference series?
Answer: for dummies
Question: The French commune of Illiers adopted the name Illiers-Combray in homage to which author whose vivid recreation of the town (through recollection) opens his vast magnum opus?
Answer: marcel proust
Question: Fill in the missing word in this famous quote of Jorge Luis Borges that is very appropriate coming from a writer! "I have always imagined that paradise will be a kind of ___."
Answer: library
Question: No sleuthing allowed. What struggling doctor wrote The Narrative of John Smith that was published in 2011 about 130 years after it was first written?
Answer: arthur conan doyle
Question: What concocted 1903 text that asserts a Jewish plan to take over the world is sometimes cited as Hitler's justification for the Holocaust?
Answer: protocols of elders of zion
Question: Which 17th century literary classic ends with the title character stipulating in his will that his niece will be disinherited if she marries anyone who reads about chivalry?
Answer: don quixote
Question: What term that is a mechanism for the disappearance of inconvenient documents comes from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four in which it is a slot into which officials deposit records to be destroyed?
Answer: memory hole
Question: Who wrote the 1942 short story Runaround that lists three laws one of which is stated below? 'A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm'
Answer: isaac asimov
Question: Michel de Montaigne of France is best known for popularizing what kind of writing as a literary genre?
Answer: essay
Question: In what story of Arthur C. Clarke do Tibetan monks seek to list all the names of God as they believe He will bring the Universe to an end once this is done?
Answer: nine billion names of god
Question: Similar to John Reed's Ten Days that Shook the World, which influential 1930s book by Edgar Snow is an account of the Communist Party of China?
Answer: red star over china
Question: Which 1853 narrative poem of Matthew Arnold set in the orient tells the story of two feuding warrior-generals who, unknown to both, happen to be father and son?
Answer: sohrab and rustum
Question: Which 1902 short story by W. W. Jacobs is based on the premise of three wishes coming true but with an enormous price for interfering with fate?
Answer: monkey s paw
Question: William Golding's Lord of the Flies was written as a response to which 1857 adventure novel by R. M. Ballantyne because Golding disagreed with the views that the book held?
Answer: coral island
Question: Which 1844 novel of William Makepeace Thackeray, later adapted into a movie by Stanley Kubrick, is based on the life of an Anglo-Irish fortune-hunter called Andrew Robinson Stoney?
Answer: luck of barry lyndon
Question: The English novelist Sax Rohmer is best known for creating which prototypical ethnic villain who is now associated with a distinctive mustache?
Answer: dr fu manchu
Question: 'The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.' This unforgettable opening line is from which author's A Bend in the River and lent itself to the title of that authors authorized biography The World Is What It Is by Patrick French?
Answer: v s naipaul
Question: The most-translated contemporary Italian writer at the time of his death in 1985, whose best known works are the Our Ancestors trilogy and the Cosmicomics collection of short stories?
Answer: italo calvino
Question: What classic short story by the French writer Guy de Maupassant concerns an invisible malevolent spirit that aims to take control over the narrator?
Answer: horla
Question: Which 1961 non-fiction book by US journalist John Howard Griffin describes his six-week experience travelling on buses through racially segregated states while passing as a black man?
Answer: black like me
Question: The title of which classic set in Africa is taken from a line in Yeats' poem The Second Coming and precedes the words 'the centre cannot hold'?
Answer: things fall apart 1958
Question: Which 1899 book by Thorstein Veblen that originated the phrase 'conspicuous consumption' is considered one of the first detailed critiques of consumerism?
Answer: theory of leisure class
Question: What type of utensil that is frequently used in nonsense poetry first appeared in Edward Lear's best-known poem The Owl and the Pussycat?
Answer: runcible spoon
Question: The 'Younger Memnon' statue of Ramesses II in the British Museum is thought to have inspired which famous poem of P. B. Shelley?
Answer: ozymandias
Question: Which Norwegian fairy tale is about three goats who want to cross a bridge under which lurks a fearsome troll?
Answer: three billy goats gruff
Question: What 1908 satirical work by the Nobel Prize winning French author Anatole France describes a fictitious island of great auks that exists on the northern coast of Europe?
Answer: penguin island
Question: In the US and Canada, what appropriately titled book of Dr. Seuss is a popular gift for students graduating from high school and college?
Answer: oh places you ll go
Question: The 1954 publication of the book Seduction of the Innocent which protested the harmful effects of mass media on children led to a U.S. Congressional inquiry into what genre of publishing?
Answer: comic book industry
Question: In 2004, the government of Equatorial Guinea accused which popular English author of being one of the financiers of a failed 2004 coup d'état attempt against it?
Answer: jeffrey archer
Question: Because A. A. Milne was critical towards him for pandering to Germans during WWII, which English author created a ridiculous character named Timothy Bobbin to parody some of Milne's poetry?
Answer: p g wodehouse
Question: Which 1944 work of Friedrich Hayek is among the most influential expositions of classical liberalism and is stated as the single book that significantly shaped the political ideologies of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan?
Answer: road to serfdom
Question: When he was killed in a car crash in 1960, which existentialist became the shortest-lived of any literature Nobel laurate till date?
Answer: albert camus
Question: Which 1975 book by the Australian philosopher Peter Singer is considered to be the founding philosophical statement of the animal rights movement?
Answer: animal liberation
Question: Utopia by Thomas More is largely based on which influential work of philosophy and political theory?
Answer: plato s republic
Question: The Other Side of Me is the autobiography of which popular American author and creator of the TV series I Dream of Jeannie?
Answer: sidney sheldon
Question: If Cornelius Ryan's The Longest Day details the D-Day invasion of Normandy, and The Last Battle tells about the Battle of Berlin, which of his books tells the story of Operation Market Garden in WWII?
Answer: bridge too far 1974
Question: The American travel writer and novelist Paul Theroux's book Sir Vidia's Shadow provides a caustic portrait of which other famous author?
Answer: v s naipaul
Question: Which 1961 book by Frantz Fanon was described by Time magazine as 'this is not so much a book as a rock thrown through the windows of the West. It is the Communist Manifesto or the Mein Kampf of the anticolonial revolution ...'?
Answer: wretched of earth
Question: What genre of literature is generally believed to have been invented by the English author Horace Walpole with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto?
Answer: gothic fiction
Question: Which 1966 postcolonial parallel novel by Jean Rhys acts as a prequel to Charlotte Brontë's 1847 novel Jane Eyre?
Answer: wide sargasso sea
Question: What is observed annually on June 16 in Dublin to celebrate the life of James Joyce and relive the events in his novel Ulysses?
Answer: bloomsday
Question: Which influential 19th century work on military strategy by Prussian general Carl von Clausewitz is prescribed at various military academies to this day?
Answer: on war
Question: Jawaharlal Nehru, the Prime Minister of India spoke with Khrushchev and was partly instrumental in preventing the expulsion of which writer from the Soviet Union after that person won the Nobel Prize for Literature?
Answer: boris pasternak
Question: If Maugham's The Moon and Sixpence fictionalizes the life of Paul Gauguin, his novel Cakes and Ale contains characterizations of which English author who never lived in Wessex?
Answer: thomas hardy
Question: Which well-known short story about time travel by Ray Bradbury is a fictional exploration of the 'butterfly effect' of Chaos theory?
Answer: sound of thunder
Question: The 2000 film Finding Forrester in which Sean Connery plays a reclusive author was loosely based on the life of which person who passed away in 2010?
Answer: j d salinger
Question: Which classic Middle Eastern story of star-crossed lovers is based on the real story of a young man called Qays ibn al-Mullawah and has achieved legendary status in the Islamic world?
Answer: layla and majnun
Question: Which 1903 book by Erskine Childers that is still enjoyed for its accurate portrayal of inland sailing was credited by Winston Churchill as a major reason for the establishment of naval bases in the UK?
Answer: riddle of sands
Question: Mark Twain's ridiculing of chivalry in his story A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is considered as specifically targeting whose books?
Answer: walter scott
Question: In Dante's Divine Comedy, if Hell is divided into 9 circles and Paradise into 9 spheres, what is divided into 7 terraces?
Answer: purgatory
Question: In the Indiana Jones series of novels, Indiana loses his virginity to which real life spy?
Answer: mata hari
Question: Karataka and Damanaka are the names of two jackals that are retainers to a lion king. Their lively adventures as well as the stories they tell one another make up nearly half of which classic ancient Sanskrit work?
Answer: panchatantra
Question: The name of what genre has its origin in what producers Jerry Kasenetz and Jeff Katz had in their mouths when they discussed music targeting the younger crowd?
Answer: bubblegum pop
Question: In 1934, a regulation promulgated in a certain country required that when the Horst-Wessel-Lied was sung, what gesture must be performed?
Answer: hitler salute
Question: Ships of what cruise line use the tune of "When You Wish upon a Star" from Pinnochio as the melody of their horns?
Answer: disney cruise
Question: Whose March 31, 1994 appearance on Late Show with David Letterman resulted in the episode becoming the most censored in American network television talk-show history for obvious reasons?
Answer: madonna
Question: Who is the American entertainer who shares her name with a West African Empire known for its symbol of Golden Stool?
Answer: ashanti
Question: Whose Symphony No. 1 was called "Beethoven's Tenth" by conductor Hans von Bülow?
Answer: brahms
Question: India's national anthem is written in what language that is also the national language of one of its neighbors?
Answer: bengali
Question: What album of Sting takes its title from a sonnet he quoted in response to a drunk's query, "How beautiful is the moon?"?
Answer: nothing like sun
Question: The musical ensemble arrangement called 'gamelan' which often accompanies wayang puppet performances (among others) is a tradition of what Asian country?
Answer: indonesia
Question: An aversion therapy called the 'Ludovico technique' from the 1971 classic A Clockwork Orange features which composer's music? Kudos if you can name the piece too.
Answer: beethoven s ninth symphony
Question: Composer Philip Glass's 'Portrait Trilogy' of operas consists of Einstein on the Beach, Akhnaten and Satyagraha with the last one focusing on whom?
Answer: mahatma gandhi
Question: What is the better known name of Violin Sonata in G minor by Giuseppe Tartini that the composer said was played to him in a dream by Satan himself?
Answer: devil s trill sonata
Question: In which country did the dictator Rafael Trujillo promote the merengue style of music/dance into the country's national music?
Answer: dominican republic
Question: As its lyrics attest, what 1974 rock classic that celebrates a place was written in response to two songs of Neil Young that were derogatory of the American South?
Answer: sweet home alabama
Question: What song by The Doors that has a strong reference to the Oedipus complex got them fired from the Whisky a Go Go nightclub in West Hollywood?
Answer: end
Question: What musical instrument that takes its name from a muse was used in riverboats and in circuses because of its loudness?
Answer: calliope
Question: The phrase "it's better to burn out than to fade away" from Neil Young's classic song "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" became better known after being quoted in whose 1994 suicide note?
Answer: nirvana s kurt cobain
Question: The short poem And did those feet in ancient time by William Blake that features the phrase 'dark satanic mills' is best known in what musical context?
Answer: anthem jerusalem
Question: What is the term given to a musical that uses previously released popular songs as its musical score, examples of which are Mamma Mia! and Jersey Boys?
Answer: jukebox musical
Question: Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac avoided black clothing to distance herself from the dark arts associations surrounding her as a result of which of the band's hit song?
Answer: rhiannon
Question: Due to the large number of languages used in the European Union, its anthem is purely instrumental. Despite this, the German lyrics from what work of Friedrich Schiller, connected to Beethoven, are often sung when the anthem is played?
Answer: ode to joy
Question: Which overture written by Felix Mendelssohn was inspired by the echoes of a Scottish sea cave that he visited in 1829 and was named for it?
Answer: fingal s cave overture
Question: If the Julliard School is to New York, the Berklee College of Music is to which city?
Answer: boston
Question: The Italian soprano Renata Tebaldi who is acclaimed as one of the most beloved opera singers of all time was known for her rivalry with which other legendary soprano?
Answer: maria callas
Question: Clang! The Avedis Zildjian Company is best known for producing and popularizing what musical instruments?
Answer: cymbals
Question: Which 1974 song made famous by the girl group 'Labelle' is most famous for its sexually suggestive chorus of 'voulez-vous coucher avec moi (ce soir)?' that translates as 'Do you want to sleep with me (tonight)?'?
Answer: lady marmalade
Question: 'Kling Klang' is the private music studio of which highly influential electronic music band from Germany?
Answer: kraftwerk
Question: The annual music festival 'Lollapalooza' was conceived and created in 1991 by singer Perry Farrell of which band as a farewell tour for his band?
Answer: jane s addiction
Question: The Queen song "Radio Ga Ga" is said to be the main inspiration behind the name of what current day hit singer?
Answer: lady gaga
Question: """Hail to the Chief"", the march primarily associated with the President of the US has verses derived from which narrative poem of Walter Scott?"
Answer: lady of lake
Question: Which American song that remains a fundamental part of a jazz musicians' repertoire has been called 'the jazzman's Hamlet' and has also been used as an NHL team name?
Answer: st louis blues
Question: Which enormously influential classical composer spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Hungarian aristocratic Esterházy family?
Answer: joseph haydn
Question: Which 1980 supergroup consisting of George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty and Bob Dylan decided to use a word with a single 'L' instead of a double 'L' in their name because the band started in America and consisted of three Americans and only two Britons?
Answer: traveling wilburys
Question: Which city in Germany is famed for hosting the annual Wagner festival?
Answer: bayreuth
Question: According to the Guinness Book of World Records, which song usually sung to congratulate a person is the second-most popular song following "Happy Birthday to You" in the English language?
Answer: for he s jolly good fellow
Question: In vocal jazz, what is the style in which vocal improvisation is made with random syllables or even without words?
Answer: scat singing
Question: In the American music industry, what is the term given to the illegal practice of payment by record companies for the broadcast of recordings on music radio, in which the song is presented as being part of the normal day's broadcast?
Answer: payola
Question: Which much-covered New Orleans song tells of a parade collision between two 'tribes' of Mardi Gras Indians was written under the original title "Jock-A-Mo" in 1954?
Answer: iko iko
Question: Which musical instrument named after its Russian inventor is unique in that it is designed to be played without being touched?
Answer: theremin
Question: Which song written by the Hungarian pianist and composer Rezső Seress in 1933 was marketed as 'Hungarian suicide song' as it was mistakenly believed to have inspired hundreds of suicides?
Answer: gloomy sunday
Question: What is the musical term for a playing technique that involves plucking the strings of an instrument?
Answer: pizzicato
Question: Which famous Irish traditional song about a highwayman (usually in the Cork and Kerry mountains) was given a rock veneer by the rock band Thin Lizzy?
Answer: whiskey in jar
Question: Which Swedish pop group went through the names 'Kalinin Prospect', CAD (Computer-Aided Disco) and Tech-Noir before settling on their present name as nobody could remember their previous names?
Answer: ace of base
Question: Which British musician who worked on engineering projects as Paul McCartney's 'Wild Life' and Pink Floyd's' The Dark Side of the Moon' also started an eponymous progressive rock band that was active between 1975 and 1987?
Answer: alan parsons
Question: Which 1982 song by the London punk rock group 'The Clash' is about Iran's outlawing of rock music, and also become the unofficial anthem for the Armed Forces during the Gulf War conflicts?
Answer: rock casbah
Question: Can you connect the singer Bobby McFerrin with the mystic Meher Baba?
Answer: don t worry be happy
Question: Which collection of orchestral movements were composed by George Frideric Handel in 1717 at the request of King George I? These are also his best known work.
Answer: water music