Q 01/05

What was Maya Angelou's birth name?

A) Marguerite Louise Baxter

B) Margaret Louise Johnson

C) Marguerite Annie Johnson

D) Margaret Annie Baxter

Answer · why

C) Marguerite Annie Johnson

Marguerite Annie Johnson worked for a white employer in Caged Bird who insisted on calling her Mary, and she took her revenge by breaking the woman's ...

Q 02/05

In which city was Angelou born in 1928?

A) Memphis, Tennessee

B) Oakland, California

C) Winston-Salem, North Carolina

D) St. Louis, Missouri

Answer · why

D) St. Louis, Missouri

St. Louis, Missouri, was her birthplace, but when her parents split, her father sent the children alone by train to their grandmother in Arkansas.

Q 03/05

Who first called Angelou by the nickname that became her famous first name?

A) Her grandmother

B) Her older brother

C) Her mother

D) Her father

Answer · why

B) Her older brother

Her older brother, Bailey Jr., coined it; in the family telling he called her 'My', for 'my sister', which grew into 'Maya'.

Q 04/05

In which Arkansas town did Angelou grow up with her paternal grandmother?

A) Stamps

B) Hope

C) Pine Bluff

D) Texarkana

Answer · why

A) Stamps

Stamps had a white dentist who, she wrote in Caged Bird, refused to treat her toothache even though her grandmother had once lent him money.

Q 05/05

Why did the young Angelou stop speaking for years after being raped?

A) She blamed her voice for a death

B) Her grandmother forbade it

C) She feared her attacker's return

D) An illness damaged her throat

Answer · why

A) She blamed her voice for a death

She blamed her voice for a death: after she named her attacker he was murdered, and she feared speaking again might kill someone else.