Question - 688

Identify the person on the right of the black-and-white picture and connect her to two objects on the right.

Question - 655

Identify the person and the reason behind the title.

Answer: George Best who was at least as famous for his off the field exploits as he was for his incredible football talent. He was once asked how close to a match he has had sex and he replied Half-time and thus the title. Divya Shankar, Krithi, Raghu, Kapinjal, Krishna, Matti and Siddarth Pai got it. Well done.

Question - 609

Two different art forms dramatically depict what historical event?

Answer: The surrender of Vercingetorix, who tried to unite the Gauls against the Romans, to Julius Caesar. It is a central element in the Asterix comics plotline. Saket, Sameer Gauria, Mohan Phadnis, Dinesh, matti tapaninen, and Manix got it.

Question - 607

Identify and connect.

Answer: The connect is the Fountain of Youth. The map shows the 1513 voyage of the Ponce de Leon, who was famous for his quest for the fountain. The next installment of Pirates of the Caribbean (based on the book "On Stranger Tides" by Tim Powers) deals with a similar quest. Saket, Sribharath, matti tapaninen, Krithi, mekie, and Jamie got it. Good job.

Question - 602

Connect the woman (in B/W) to the two images on the left.

Question - 566

This astronomical phenomenon has been used to explain what event? (click on the picture to see the animation)

Answer: The Star of Bethlehem had been conjectured (by Kepler, among others) to be caused by the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn. The gif image above shows the night sky as it appeared looking south from Jerusalem on Nov. 12, 7 BC, 6 PM to 9:30 PM (via Wikipedia). Dinesh, matti tapaninen, Piyush Singh, and Jaggi got it.

Question - 563

Identify and connect.

Answer: The War of Roses, depicted in Shakespeare's Henry VI (top left) and now continued as a sporting rivalry - cricket (Yorkshire v. Lancashire), football (Manchester Utd. v. Leeds Utd.) and rugby. mekie, Anand, Firebringer, and matti tapaninen got it. Well done.

Question - 562

Connect to an engineering concept?

Answer: Van Eck Phreaking - a way to spy on electronic displays by detecting their electromagnetic radiation, popularized by Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon. mekie, Krithi, Divya Shankar, and Dinesh got it. Awesome crack.

Question - 560

Whose journey?

Answer: The journey of Aeneas, a Trojan who became the ancestor of the Romans, as recounted in Virgil's Aeneid. matti tapaninen, Divya Shankar, and Hirak got it. Nice crack.

Questioin - 535

Connect the woman to the practice shown in the first visual.

Answer: The first visual shows a bunch of people being sprayed with DDT as a "health" measure against malarial attack. The second visual shows Rachel Carson whose revolutionary Silent Spring outlined the dangers of DDT and gave birth to the environmental movement as we know it today. Kamal Rathi and Jamie got it. Well done.

Question - 497

A controversial strip that led to a famous book whose cover is shown on the right. Identify all and also the resulting storyline changes.

Answer: This panel shows Batman and Robin and the homosexual overtones are hard to miss. This and other similar issues in the comics industry (such as the bondage subtext in Wonder Woman) led to an outraged polemic called Seduction of the Innocent by a psychiatrist called Fredric Wertham in which he claimed that such comics corrupt America's youth. In response, the batman franchise introduced Bat-woman and Bat-girl into the Batman universe. AJ, White Jack and Black Lagoon, Kamal Rathi, Ramki, Jamie, anon, Manix and tsp got it. Well done.

Question - 489

Identify or connect.

Answer: The connect is Luis Ramirez de Lucena (bottom right). He is the author of the oldest existing printed book on chess - Repetición de Amores e Arte de Axedrez or Repetition of Love and the Art of Playing Chess published in 1497 (a page from the book is shown on the left). The Lucena postion (top right) is a famous chess endgame position named after him. Matti, Kamal, Manix, Divya, Anand, and Rajeev got it right. Well done. Dinky is back at the helm from Monday. It's been fun. Thanks for playing.

Question - 488

Identify and connect.

Answer: The connect is Flashman, a character in Thomas Hughes's Tom Brown's Schooldays (right) later developed into the antihero Henry Paget Flashman in the Flashman novels (left) by George MacDonald Fraser. Karthik, Mekie, Dinesh, Anon, and Kamal Rathi got it. Nicely done.

Question - 487

Connect.

Hint: Origin of the McMeme.

Answer: Gray's/Grey's Anatomy. On the left is Henry Gray, the eponymous author of the classic medical textbook Gray's Anatomy, now in its 40th edition. On the right is Shonda Rhimes, the creator of the popcult classic Grey's Anatomy -- which gave us McDreamy, McSteamy, and other McMemes. Dinesh, Mekie, and Kamal Rathi got it right. Well done.

Question - 486

This is the procedure for doing what?

Answer: Harvesting the Mandrake root. According to legend, the screams of the Mandrake root could kill the person uprooting it. So an elaborate procedure was devised involving a sacrificial dog. Of course, J. K. Rowling used the more animal-friendly "earmuffs" approach in her books. Dinesh, Ameya, Anon, Adi, Jaggi, and Mekie answered correctly. Well done.

Question - 485

Identify this uniquely original manuscript.

Answer: This "scroll" is the original manuscript of On the Road by Jack Kerouac. Dinesh, Rajeev, Adi, Karthik, Mekie, Matti Tapaninen, and Hirak got it right. Well done. Apologies for the goof up of leaving the file names of the images unaltered (since corrected).

Question - 484

Connect (non-exhaustive).

Answer: The connect is authors whose characters have been portrayed by Johnny Depp. Clockwise from top left: J. M. Barrie (as himself in Finding Neverland), Roald Dahl (Willy Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory), Hunter S. Thompson (Raoul Duke in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Paul Kemp in the upcoming The Rum Dairy), Lord Byron (Don Juan in Don Juan DeMarco), Stephan King (Mort Rainey in Secret Window), and Lewis Carroll (Mad hatter in Alice in Wonderland). Tough one. Rajeev, Dinesh, Abstract Randomness, and Rithwik got it. Awesome crack.

Question - 483

Connect.

Answer: The connect is Saki. It was the pen name of the brilliant H. H. Munro (bottom right) and supposedly referred to the cupbearer in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam (top right). It may also refer to a South American primate of the same name (left). Ramji, Dinesh, Mekie, Arvind, Adi, and Karthik got it.

Question - 481

What originated as a result of this statute?

Answer: The Statute of Anne gave rise to copyright law. Mekie, Karthik, Prachi, Paragbm, Matti Tapaninen, Rajesh K., Hirak, Nemani, Iam (credited for previous question as well), and Dinesh got it.

Question - 345

Identify the author. The first edition book cover for his most famous work is shown second. The title was inspired by the play in the third pic.

Any hits on the theme?

Answer: Aldous Huxley. A Brave New World is a phrase taken from The Tempest uttered by Miranda when she discovers a young man!

Answered by:
Rithwik, Rajeev, Iam, Raghu, Rajesh K, Dinky, Jaggi, Rajesh, Hari, Chithananda