His First Published Work, a Collection of Short Stories Entitled First Love, Last Rites

BOB 2007

Packet by Princeton A

Edited by Ben Colman and Andrew Uzzell

Tossups:

1. His first published work, a collection of short stories entitled First Love, Last Rites, won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1976. Characters with unusual afflictions - de Clerambault’s syndrome and Huntington's disease - have central roles in Enduring Love and Saturday, while a search for redemption for a childhood lie forms the basis for one of his best known novels, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2001. He won that prize in 1998, for a story about two lovers of Molly Lane who contrive to murder each other in the titular European city. FTP, name this British author of Atonement, Amsterdam and 2007's On Chesil Beach.

ANSWER: Ian McEwan

2. Most of the insertions into the genome caused by these have no known function. Such “endogenous” varieties of this class of biological agents now make up 5-8% of the human genome, leading some researchers to speculate about their significant effect on our evolutionary history. Because reverse transcription lacks the usual proofreading of DNA replication, they mutate very often, which explains why it is so hard to create an effective vaccine against HIV, which is a well-known example. FTP, give the general name for this most famous class of reverse-transcribing RNA viruses.

ANSWER: retroviruses (prompt on "virus" before it is mentioned)

3. He was the son of Kunti by the god Indra. His prowess as a warrior was evident from childhood, and his skill in archery was instrumental in his successful bid for the hand of Draupadi; however, an offhand remark of his mother led to his having to share her with his four brothers. His eldest brother's losses at dice lead to a 13-year exile for the family, which culminates in a war with their cousins to repossess their throne. FTP, identify this figure from the Hindu epic the Mahabharatha , one of the five sons of Pandu, whose soul-searching concerns Krishna addresses in the Bhagavad-Gita.

ANSWER: Arjuna

4. Speakers of this language are thought to have descended from a North Sea people identified with the ‘Ingaevones’ tribe of Tacitus' Germania. Its medieval ancestor was probably mutually intelligible with Old English, with which it shared many phonological features, such as a change from ‘k’ to ‘ch.’ Though no longer mutually intelligible, it remains modern English's closest living relative. A rhyme in both languages is 'Butter, bread, and green cheese, is good English, and good' this West Germanic tongue spoken mostly in the Netherlands.
ANSWER: Frisian, Fraisch, or Frysk

5. In one plate, there is a sign above the prisoners that reads “better to work than to stand thus”. The central character of the work is beating hemp, while the jailer's wife is stealing from her. The second plate shows a teapot about to shatter by a monkey and the central character, Moll Hackabout, with a Jewish merchant. A similarly titled series by the same artist replaces the female figure with the male Tom Rakewell. The final plate shows Moll's coffin being used as a tavern bar after her death from syphilis. FTP, name this series of Hogarth engravings about the life of a whore.

ANSWER: Harlot's Progress

6. An article he wrote describes a visit to hospital room of a friend who said he “marches in spirit with our ranks” in a 1930 article in a newspaper he financed called The Attack. That article was entitle “Raise the Flag High,” which is also the first line of a poem that he wrote to celebrate the martyr Horst Wessel. Between being Chancellor of Germany and Gauleiter of Berlin, his office carried out book burnings in Bebelplatz and organized Kristalnacht. FTP, name this PhD and first Reich Minister for Popular Enlightenment and Propaganda during the Nazi era.

ANSWER: Joseph Goebbels

7. It may have been sparked by the death and suspected murder of John Sassamon, who had warned Governor Josiah Winslow of an impending attack. One crucial battle was South Kingston's “Great Swamp Fight”, in which the Narraganset were decimated, but Providence and Springfield were both attacked nearly 3 months later, the conflict winding down only when the English started using so-called “Praying Indians” as scouts. Named for the Indian leader Metacom, this is, FTP, what 1675 conflict between English colonists and the Wampanoag?
ANSWER: King Philip's War

8. In real life, the characters were Kitani Minoru and Honinbo Shusai, but they were instead called Otake and unnamed, respectively, in the book. Compiled from newspaper articles the author had written in 1938, the work contains careful observations of the event, including Otake's frequent need to urinate because of a problem with his kidneys. The climax of the novel occurs when both the unnamed player and the author express disgust at Otake's sealing of a forcing move. FTP , name this Kawabata novel about an instance of a particular Asian board game.

ANSWER: The Master of Go or Meijin

9. In a 1915 work, he divided theories into experimental and non-experimental matter, and used non-experimental non-logical subtype to describe Greek sailors who were making sacrifices to Poseidon. Alfred Bonnet translated a work that introduced the Edgeworth-Bowley box and the utility possibility frontier defined in terms of individuals' curves of exchange in his Manual of Economic Politics. His index models the distribution of income within a society, and his efficiency is achieved in transactions where nobody is any worse off. For ten points, name this Italian economist.

ANSWER: Vilfredo Pareto

10. According to one characterization, it is the class of all problems which can be expressed in first order logic with a least fixed point operator adjoined. Alternatively, it is the class of all problems which can be solved in logarithmic memory by an alternating Turing machine. This class is closed under composition, implying that it is low for itself, and contains many well known problems, including finding a stable matching in a bipartite graph and primality testing. Identify, FTP, this complexity class which may or may not be equal to NP.
ANSWER: P

11. During its tenure as a POW camp, about 18,000 Soviet soldiers died there of hunger, cold, and disease. In 1942, it was converted into a concentration camp, but there were never any gas chambers there, as the mass executions took place in the camps further east. Nonetheless, it is estimated that 50,000 prisoners were killed there, and the average life expectancy among inmates was nine months. After its liberation by British and Canadian forces in April of 1945, the surviving prisoners were moved to a nearby camp, while it was burned down by flamethrowers to prevent the spread of typhus. FTP, name this Nazi concentration camp in Germany that is well known for being the place where Anne Frank was killed.
ANSWER: Bergen-Belsen

12. A magic square famously sits on its passion façade. Its construction began in 1882, but after its original architect died, Domenech Sugranyes directed the construction until the Spanish Civil War began in 1935. Catalan anarchists destroyed many original models and the architects' workshop during the war, but construction continued in 1940. Since then, no less than four different architects have headed the construction effort, which is projected to be completed in 2026. Completely funded by donations and Barcelona's most famous tourist attraction, this is, FTP, which unfinished Roman Catholic basilica-a masterpiece of Antoni Gaudí?
ANSWER: Sagrada Familia

13. Events from this period of history include the conquest of Samarkand by Abramov and the fall of Tashkent to his superior, Chernyayev. In Afghanistan, Shuja Shah was installed, but was soon deposed, leading to a disastrous retreat from Kabul. Despite the decisive British victory at Kandahar in 1880, the 2nd Anglo-Afghan War again ended with a British withdrawal and the creation of Afghanistan as a buffer state. FTP, give the term, popularized in Rudyard Kipling's Kim, for this period of Anglo-Russian rivalry over the control of Central Asia.
ANSWER: The Great Game

14. She is visited after the Urim and Thummin fail to respond. According to traditional rabbinical interpretations, her surprise at the vision of gods ascending out of the earth indicates that the appearance of Samuel was actually the work of God. After a promise of immunity, she uses her talisman to summon the recently deceased prophet, who prophesies that the king and his sons will die at the Battle of Gilboa. FTP, name this necromancer whom Saul consults to learn how he may defeat the approaching Philistines.

ANSWER: Witch of Endor

15. This novel opens with Kirsanov awaiting the arrival of his son at Marino, his estate. During his time home, Kirsanov's son, Arkady, is attracted to Madame Odintsova’s sister, Katya. Later on in the story, they marry. During the autopsy of a typhoid patient, one of the protagonists cuts himself with the scalpel, thus contracting the disease himself. The protagonist's father is moved to marry his servant Fenichka by the example of his son. FTP, name this novel which features the nihilist Bazarov, a novel by Turgenev.

ANSWER: Fathers and Sons

16. It is used in the production of l-DOPA through its conversion to l-tyrosine by the addition of a hydroxyl group in the para position. In large quantities, this depresses the production of serotonin because it uses the same transport channel as tryptophan to cross the blood brain barrier. It is synthesized in plants in part by decarboxylating prephanate. A codon for it was the first to be discovered by Marshall Nirenberg. The inability to metabolize it is called phenylketonuria. FTP, name this amino acid, which corresponds to the codon UUU.
ANSWER: phenylalanine

17. On the left, five well-dressed figures are seated around a table. Two of them are counting money. They are contrasted with the two figures on the right, who are dressed in simple robes. A faint halo can be seen above the head on one of these figures, who points his right hand at the central figure. Most of the painting is dark, except for a beam of light from the top-right corner that illuminates the faces in this painting. Two other canvases hang in the same chapel, all three of them by the same artist and depicting the same central figure. FTP, name this 1600 Caravaggio work that shows Christ summoning the title tax collector, a masterpiece of the Italian Baroque style.
ANSWER: The Calling of St. Matthewor St. Matthew’s Vocation

18. David Byrne emerges at the beginning, places a boom box on the floor, and begins to play along to the beat that is actually coming from backstage. After every song, another person joins the group playing onstage, until they are finally playing as a complete band for "Burning Down the House." The concert is well known for featuring side project Tom Tom Club playing their hit "Genius of Love," and the appearance of the ridiculous "Big Suit." FTP, name this landmark 1984 Jonathan Demme film of Talking Heads in concert on their Speaking in Tongues tour, whose name comes from a repeated line in the song "Girlfriend is Better."
ANSWER: Stop Making Sense

19. Its last line, “Trundling an empty barrow up the lane” is alleged by its principal commentator to actually not be the last line of the work. The poem’s author, we are told, is always mentioned just after Frost when speaking about great American poets. The larger work in which it is embedded, which shares the name, is used by the author as a vehicle for telling his own narrative of Zembla, the country he comes from, and is allegedly a critical edition of the poem, annotated by Charles Kinbote. FTP, name this work of Vladimir Nabokov, an implicit narrative of a somewhat mad man, possibly the exiled king of Zembla, who rides on the coattails of a brilliant fictional poet.
ANSWER: Pale Fire

20. It allowed many visitors the opportunity to visit Paris, including William Herschel and Joseph Turner. It stipulated that the Cape Colony was to be returned to the Batavian Republic and that France was to withdraw it forces from the Papal States. Importantly, it was disagreement about the implementation of the treaty with regards to the fate of Malta that led to its abrogation. FTP, name this treaty between France and England that marked the end of the Second Coalition.

ANSWER: Peace ofAmiens

Extras:

Mario Ponzo's famous one questions length, and a pair named for Ewald Hering and Wilhelm Wundt seem to bend straight horizontal lines with well placed diagonals. The Müller-Lyer one features a pair of two-sided arrows with heads reversed. In art, they are most famously seen in the works of painters such as Bridget Riley and Victor Vasarely, and many, like the Necker cube, confuse by appearing to switch between two states. FTP, what are these images, which seem to trick the eye and brain?
ANSWER: optical illusions (accept equivalents)

The ancient city of Troy was located near the western entrance of this strait, and its Asiatic shore was the focus of the Trojan War. It was also the scene of the legendary Greek story of Hero and Leander. The Persian army of Xerxes I and later the army of Alexander the Great crossed this body of water in opposite directions to invade each other’s lands, in 480 BC and 334 BC respectively. It was also vital to the defense of Constantinople from the Turks during the Byzantine period. FTP, name this narrow strait in northwestern Turkey connecting the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara, formerly known as the Hellespont.

ANSWER: Dardanelles (accept Hellespont before it is mentioned)

Bonuses:

1. FTSNOP, given the flagships and commanders from the opposing sides, name the battle.

[10] Spruance on the Yorktown vs. Yamamoto on the Yamato

ANSWER: Battle ofMidway

[10] Nelson on the Vanguard vs. Casabianca on the L'Orient

ANSWER: Battle of theNile(Aboukir Bay)

[10] Hipper on the Seydlitz vs. Beatty on the Lion

ANSWER: Battle of Dogger Bank

[0] Ackbar on the Home One vs. Piett on the Executor

ANSWER: Battle ofEndor

2. FTPE , name these things about music.

[10] Note against note, two notes against one, and four notes against one are three different species of this. Some rules for this compositional format include the need for contrary motion and beginning and ending on consonances.

ANSWER: counterpoint

[10] JJ Fux wrote this work on counterpoint. Its title is a reference to the mountain on which the Greek muses live.

ANSWER: Gradus ad Parnassum

[10] Fux claimed to illustrate this Italian Renaissance composer's style in Gradus ad Parnassum.

ANSWER: Palestrina

3. FTPE, answer the following about a superorder and its contents:

This paraphyletic superorder was named by Richard Owen in 1842. They are divided into Ornithischia and Saurischia depending on their pelvic structure.

[10] Dinosauria orDinosaur

This suborder of Saurischia contains such dinosaurs are Tyrannosaurus Rex as well as other flying dinosaurs such as birds.

[10] Therapoda or Therapods

This other suborder of Saurischia contains such big plant eating dinosaurs as argentinosaurus and contained brontosaurs until it was realized they don't actually exist.

[10] Sauropodomorpha or Sauropods

4. Romanian geography! FTPE:

[10] They are the most widespread mountains in continental Europe after the Alps, from which they are separated by the Danube. They divide the Black Sea's basin from the Baltic's.

ANSWER: Carpathianmountains

[10] The Carpathian mountains enclose and cover this northwestern Romanian province.

ANSWER: Transylvania

[10] At 2,544 meters, it is the highest mountain in Romania, located in the F?g?raş range in the Southern Carpathians.

ANSWER: Moldoveanu

5. On November 23, 2006, a former Russian spy died in a London hospital after a mysterious poisoning. FTPE:
[10] Name this man who was investigating the killing of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya and who had written a book alleging that Russian intelligence agencies were behind a string of 1999 apartment building bombings that were blamed on Chechen terrorists.
ANSWER: Alexander Litvinenko
[10] Litvinenko’s poisoning quickly drew comparisons with the 2004 dioxin poisoning of this man, now an Eastern European head of state.
ANSWER: Victor Yushchenko
[10] London was also the site of the assassination of Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian dissident who had defected to the UK and died in 1978 after getting poked by what object?
ANSWER: a poison-tippedumbrella

6. FTPE, answer the following about sugars.
[10] This projection puts all the carbon atoms on a vertical line, with vertical lines representing bonds going into the page, and horizontal lines representing bonds going out of the page.
ANSWER: Fischer Projection
[10] In this reaction, the carbonyl group of the sugar is oxidized and then decarboxylated, removing a carbon from an aldose.
ANSWER: Ruff degradation
[10] This reaction was used by Fischer to remove a stereogenic center from an aldose. D glucose and D-mannose give the same product under this reaction.
ANSWER: Osazone Formation