Do You Know Who Wrote These Classic Books?
Twenty questions matching famous works of classic literature to the authors who wrote them. Test your knowledge from Austen to Tolstoy.
About This Quiz
Classic literature is the shared inheritance of any reader, the books that get handed down across generations because they keep saying something true. Most readers know the famous opening lines (it is a truth universally acknowledged, call me Ishmael, all happy families are alike) but matching the line to the right author is harder than it looks. The Brontë sisters get confused with each other. Dickens gets credited with books he never wrote. Hemingway and Fitzgerald and Steinbeck blur together. And almost everyone has confidently misattributed a Mark Twain quote at least once in their life.
This quiz takes twenty famous works of classic literature, from Austen and the Brontës through Dickens and Tolstoy and into the early twentieth century, and asks you to name the author. Every question has a short explanation so you actually learn something whether you got it right or not.
How This Quiz Works
Each of the twenty questions names a famous book and gives you four authors to choose from. Pick the one you think wrote it. The quiz tracks your score as you go, and at the end you get a numbered result and a full review of every question, your answer, the correct answer, and a one-sentence explanation. The whole quiz takes about six minutes.
Who This Quiz Is For
This quiz is for English majors past and present, book club members, anyone studying for the SAT or AP English exam, trivia night regulars, parents quizzing high schoolers, retired English teachers reliving their glory days, and anyone who has ever felt embarrassed at a dinner party for misattributing a famous quote.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. The quiz spans roughly two centuries of classic literature, from the late 1700s through the early 1900s. It includes British, American, French, and Russian authors, all widely taught and read today.
Three sisters, all writing under male pen names initially, all publishing major novels within a few years of each other. Charlotte wrote Jane Eyre, Emily wrote Wuthering Heights, and Anne wrote The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. Even careful readers mix them up.
Yes, though some are more accessible than others. If your result points you toward an author you have not read, that is a recommendation worth taking.
No. The questions are about authorship, not plot.
About six minutes. Twenty questions, tap to answer, no typing required.