Q 01/05

In which city was J. R. R. Tolkien born in 1892?

A) Bloemfontein

B) Cape Town

C) Birmingham

D) Pretoria

Answer · why

A) Bloemfontein

His father Arthur had gone out to head the local branch of an English bank; he died of rheumatic fever before he could rejoin the family in England.

Q 02/05

What bit the infant Tolkien in the garden in South Africa?

A) A puff adder

B) A scorpion

C) A large baboon spider

D) A vervet monkey

Answer · why

C) A large baboon spider

Some see the bite echoed in Shelob and the spiders of Mirkwood, though he said he had no memory of it.

Q 03/05

Tolkien's aunt Jane's farm gave its name to which place in his fiction?

A) Rivendell

B) Bag End

C) Bree

D) Buckland

Answer · why

B) Bag End

He grew up exploring Sarehole Mill, Moseley Bog and the Clent, Lickey and Malvern Hills, all of which fed the books.

Q 04/05

Which children's book did the young Tolkien dislike?

A) Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

B) The Princess and the Goblin

C) The Red Fairy Book

D) Treasure Island

Answer · why

D) Treasure Island

He found Alice merely 'amusing', but loved George MacDonald's fantasies and Andrew Lang's Fairy Books.

Q 05/05

Tolkien's mother Mabel died in 1904 of what, when he was 12?

A) Tuberculosis

B) Typhoid

C) Pneumonia

D) Acute diabetes

Answer · why

D) Acute diabetes

Insulin was not discovered until 1921; her Baptist family had cut her off when she became a Catholic in 1900.