Dystopian Novels Quiz
Big Brother, soma, Gilead and Room 101: 15 questions on the novels that imagined the worst.
Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 takes its title from what?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
The temperature at which book paper burns
Bradbury was told by a fire chief that book paper ignites at 451 degrees Fahrenheit (about 233 degrees Celsius), and he used the figure as the title of his 1953 novel about firemen who burn books.
Bradbury wrote the first draft on a rented typewriter in the basement of the UCLA library, paying ten cents per half hour.
In George Orwell's 1984, what is the name of the Party's ever-watchful figurehead whose face stares from every poster?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Big Brother
Big Brother is the moustached face of the Party, and the slogan Big Brother Is Watching You sums up a state where telescreens monitor every citizen in Airstrip One.
Orwell finished the novel on the Scottish island of Jura while seriously ill with tuberculosis, and died seven months after it was published.
In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, what is the name of the theocratic republic that has replaced the United States?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Gilead
Gilead is the totalitarian state in which the narrator, Offred, is forced to bear children for a ruling family, and its name comes from a region in the Hebrew Bible.
Atwood has said she included nothing in the novel that humans had not already done somewhere at some time.
In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, what colour are the robes the Handmaids must wear?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Red
Handmaids wear red dresses with white winged bonnets, while the Wives wear blue and the Marthas wear green, so a woman's role in Gilead can be read at a glance.
Atwood has said she included nothing in the novel that humans had not already done somewhere, at some time.
Who wrote Brave New World, published in 1932?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Huxley's Brave New World imagines a World State where humans are grown in hatcheries, sorted into castes and kept content with pleasure rather than fear.
Huxley died on 22 November 1963, the same day as C. S. Lewis and President John F. Kennedy.
In Brave New World, what is the name of the drug that keeps citizens of the World State happy and compliant?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Soma
Soma is a government-issued drug that delivers a holiday from reality with no hangover, summed up in the slogan a gramme is better than a damn.
Huxley borrowed the name from the sacred ritual drink described in the ancient Vedic hymns of India, whose recipe has never been identified.
In 1984, which numbered location inside the Ministry of Love holds the worst thing in the world for each prisoner?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Room 101
Room 101 contains each prisoner's own worst fear; for Winston Smith it is a cage of rats, and the threat of it finally makes him betray Julia.
Orwell reportedly took the number from a conference room at the BBC's Broadcasting House, where he sat through tedious wartime meetings.
Which 1962 novel by Anthony Burgess follows the teenage thug Alex and his droogs, narrated in a slang called Nadsat?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange mixes Russian-derived slang with Cockney rhyming slang to tell the story of Alex, a violent delinquent subjected to the state's Ludovico aversion therapy.
Burgess claimed the title came from an old Cockney expression, as queer as a clockwork orange, though no one has found it used before him.
Which major prize did Cormac McCarthy's The Road win in 2007?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
The Road, the story of a father and son walking south through an ash-covered America, won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction a year after its publication.
McCarthy said the book began as a conversation with his young son in a hotel room in El Paso, imagining the city in flames.
In Lois Lowry's The Giver, which role is Jonas assigned at the Ceremony of Twelve?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Receiver of Memory
Jonas is chosen as the community's next Receiver of Memory, the one person who holds the memories of colour, pain, love and war that everyone else has given up.
The Giver won the Newbery Medal in 1994 and has been one of the most frequently challenged books in American school libraries ever since.
In Fahrenheit 451, what is the name of the robotic creature the firemen use to track down fugitives?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
The Mechanical Hound
The Mechanical Hound is an eight-legged machine with a needle full of procaine in its snout, and it hunts Guy Montag through the city after he turns against the firemen.
Bradbury's 1966 film adaptation, directed by François Truffaut, left the Hound out entirely because it could not be made convincing.
In Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go, what is the name of the boarding school where Kathy, Ruth and Tommy grow up?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Hailsham
Hailsham is the seemingly idyllic English school whose pupils slowly learn they are clones raised to donate their organs, a truth Ishiguro reveals through hints rather than shocks.
Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2017, twelve years after the novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
Who wrote The Children of Men, the 1992 novel set in an England where no child has been born for a generation?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
P. D. James
P. D. James, best known for her Adam Dalgliesh detective novels, set The Children of Men in 2021, more than 25 years after the whole human race suddenly became infertile.
Alfonso Cuarón's 2006 film version kept the premise and the hero Theo Faron but rewrote most of the plot, giving the miraculous pregnancy to a refugee named Kee.
Which author wrote Parable of the Sower, the 1993 novel in which Lauren Olamina founds a religion called Earthseed in a collapsing California?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Octavia E. Butler
Octavia E. Butler's Parable of the Sower begins in 2024 in a walled Los Angeles suburb and follows Lauren north as she develops Earthseed, whose central tenet is God is Change.
Butler was the first science fiction writer to receive a MacArthur Fellowship, the so-called genius grant, in 1995.
Which Russian novel, written in 1920 and 1921 and first published in English in 1924, has citizens known only by numbers and served as a model for 1984?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
We
Yevgeny Zamyatin's We, set in the glass-walled OneState where the narrator is called D-503, was banned in the Soviet Union, and Orwell read it in French shortly before starting 1984.
We was not published in Russian in the Soviet Union until 1988, more than fifty years after Zamyatin's death in exile in Paris.
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All Literature quizzes →About the Dystopian Novels Quiz
Ray Bradbury named Fahrenheit 451 after the temperature at which he was told book paper catches fire. George Orwell borrowed the bones of 1984 from a banned Russian novel, and Cormac McCarthy's The Road won the Pulitzer Prize with barely a named character in it.
These 15 questions cover the dystopias everyone reads at school, from Big Brother and soma to the Mechanical Hound and the red robes of Gilead, then dig deeper into Zamyatin's We, P. D. James, Kazuo Ishiguro and Octavia E. Butler. It suits book club regulars, students revising set texts and anyone who likes their fiction bleak and brilliant.
You will find 15 multiple choice questions here, each with four options. Difficulty: Medium. Most people finish in about 6 minutes, and every answer comes with a short explanation and one extra fact worth keeping.
How to play
Read the question and pick one of the four answers. The correct answer is revealed straight away with a short explanation, then press Next question to keep going. At the end you get your score out of 15 and a full review of your round. Play again any time and the questions arrive in a fresh order. There is no timer and no account.
Good to know before you play
What counts as a dystopian novel?
A dystopian novel imagines a society that has gone badly wrong, usually through oppressive government, technology or environmental collapse, and uses that world to criticise trends in the author's own time.
What is the earliest dystopian novel in this quiz?
Yevgeny Zamyatin's We, written in 1920 and 1921 and first published in English in 1924, predates Brave New World by eight years and 1984 by a quarter of a century.
Why is it called Nineteen Eighty-Four?
Orwell finished the novel in 1948 and is widely thought to have swapped the last two digits, though he also considered the title The Last Man in Europe.
Answer key: all 15 questions with explanations
- Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 takes its title from what?
The temperature at which book paper burns Bradbury was told by a fire chief that book paper ignites at 451 degrees Fahrenheit (about 233 degrees Celsius), and he used the figure as the title of his 1953 novel about firemen who burn books. Bradbury wrote the first draft on a rented typewriter in the basement of the UCLA library, paying ten cents per half hour. - In George Orwell's 1984, what is the name of the Party's ever-watchful figurehead whose face stares from every poster?
Big Brother Big Brother is the moustached face of the Party, and the slogan Big Brother Is Watching You sums up a state where telescreens monitor every citizen in Airstrip One. Orwell finished the novel on the Scottish island of Jura while seriously ill with tuberculosis, and died seven months after it was published. - In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, what is the name of the theocratic republic that has replaced the United States?
Gilead Gilead is the totalitarian state in which the narrator, Offred, is forced to bear children for a ruling family, and its name comes from a region in the Hebrew Bible. Atwood has said she included nothing in the novel that humans had not already done somewhere at some time. - In Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, what colour are the robes the Handmaids must wear?
Red Handmaids wear red dresses with white winged bonnets, while the Wives wear blue and the Marthas wear green, so a woman's role in Gilead can be read at a glance. Atwood has said she included nothing in the novel that humans had not already done somewhere, at some time. - Who wrote Brave New World, published in 1932?
Aldous Huxley Aldous Huxley's Brave New World imagines a World State where humans are grown in hatcheries, sorted into castes and kept content with pleasure rather than fear. Huxley died on 22 November 1963, the same day as C. S. Lewis and President John F. Kennedy. - In Brave New World, what is the name of the drug that keeps citizens of the World State happy and compliant?
Soma Soma is a government-issued drug that delivers a holiday from reality with no hangover, summed up in the slogan a gramme is better than a damn. Huxley borrowed the name from the sacred ritual drink described in the ancient Vedic hymns of India, whose recipe has never been identified. - In 1984, which numbered location inside the Ministry of Love holds the worst thing in the world for each prisoner?
Room 101 Room 101 contains each prisoner's own worst fear; for Winston Smith it is a cage of rats, and the threat of it finally makes him betray Julia. Orwell reportedly took the number from a conference room at the BBC's Broadcasting House, where he sat through tedious wartime meetings. - Which 1962 novel by Anthony Burgess follows the teenage thug Alex and his droogs, narrated in a slang called Nadsat?
A Clockwork Orange A Clockwork Orange mixes Russian-derived slang with Cockney rhyming slang to tell the story of Alex, a violent delinquent subjected to the state's Ludovico aversion therapy. Burgess claimed the title came from an old Cockney expression, as queer as a clockwork orange, though no one has found it used before him. - Which major prize did Cormac McCarthy's The Road win in 2007?
The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction The Road, the story of a father and son walking south through an ash-covered America, won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction a year after its publication. McCarthy said the book began as a conversation with his young son in a hotel room in El Paso, imagining the city in flames. - In Lois Lowry's The Giver, which role is Jonas assigned at the Ceremony of Twelve?
Receiver of Memory Jonas is chosen as the community's next Receiver of Memory, the one person who holds the memories of colour, pain, love and war that everyone else has given up. The Giver won the Newbery Medal in 1994 and has been one of the most frequently challenged books in American school libraries ever since. - In Fahrenheit 451, what is the name of the robotic creature the firemen use to track down fugitives?
The Mechanical Hound The Mechanical Hound is an eight-legged machine with a needle full of procaine in its snout, and it hunts Guy Montag through the city after he turns against the firemen. Bradbury's 1966 film adaptation, directed by François Truffaut, left the Hound out entirely because it could not be made convincing. - In Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go, what is the name of the boarding school where Kathy, Ruth and Tommy grow up?
Hailsham Hailsham is the seemingly idyllic English school whose pupils slowly learn they are clones raised to donate their organs, a truth Ishiguro reveals through hints rather than shocks. Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2017, twelve years after the novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. - Who wrote The Children of Men, the 1992 novel set in an England where no child has been born for a generation?
P. D. James P. D. James, best known for her Adam Dalgliesh detective novels, set The Children of Men in 2021, more than 25 years after the whole human race suddenly became infertile. Alfonso Cuarón's 2006 film version kept the premise and the hero Theo Faron but rewrote most of the plot, giving the miraculous pregnancy to a refugee named Kee. - Which author wrote Parable of the Sower, the 1993 novel in which Lauren Olamina founds a religion called Earthseed in a collapsing California?
Octavia E. Butler Octavia E. Butler's Parable of the Sower begins in 2024 in a walled Los Angeles suburb and follows Lauren north as she develops Earthseed, whose central tenet is God is Change. Butler was the first science fiction writer to receive a MacArthur Fellowship, the so-called genius grant, in 1995. - Which Russian novel, written in 1920 and 1921 and first published in English in 1924, has citizens known only by numbers and served as a model for 1984?
We Yevgeny Zamyatin's We, set in the glass-walled OneState where the narrator is called D-503, was banned in the Soviet Union, and Orwell read it in French shortly before starting 1984. We was not published in Russian in the Soviet Union until 1988, more than fifty years after Zamyatin's death in exile in Paris.
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