Q 01/05
A) Salman Rushdie
B) Vikram Seth
C) Arundhati Roy
D) V. S. Naipaul
Answer · why
It was only his second novel, yet it is widely credited with launching the 'post-Rushdie' decade of Indian writing in English.
Q 02/05
A) Shiva Sinai
B) Saleem Sinai
C) Aadam Aziz
D) Nadir Khan
Answer · why
Saleem tells his own life story aloud to Padma, his wife-to-be, in a structure the novel likens to the Arabian Nights.
Q 03/05
A) Noon, 14 August 1947
B) Dawn, 26 January 1950
C) Midnight, 15 August 1947
D) Midnight, 1 January 1948
Answer · why
The timing makes him precisely as old as independent India, and the novel treats the two biographies as one.
Q 04/05
A) 1981
B) 1984
C) 1987
D) 1990
Answer · why
Jonathan Cape published it, with a cover design by Bill Botten.
Q 05/05
A) The Pulitzer
B) The Whitbread
C) The Nobel
D) The Booker
Answer · why
It went on to be named Booker of Bookers in 1993 and Best of the Booker in 2008.
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