All Free English Literature MCQs with Answers

• A. The Hound of the Baskervilles
• B. The Sign of the Four
• C. The Valley of Fear
• D. A Study in Scarlet

Explanation: Sherlock Holmes first appeared in A Study in Scarlet (1887), which introduces both Holmes and Dr Watson.

• A. John Gay
• B. Sir Arthur Canon Doyle
• C. Dylan Thomas
• D. Somerset Maugham

Explanation: Sherlock Holmes was created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose surname is misspelled as “Canon Doyle” in the option.

• A. Jules Verne
• B. H. G. Wells
• C. Mark Twain
• D. Charles Dickens

Explanation: Jules Verne wrote this 1872 adventure novel about Phileas Fogg's wager to travel around the world in eighty days. H. G.

• A. Samuel Richardson
• B. Samuel Johnson
• C. Samuel Beckett
• D. None of the above

Explanation: Samuel Richardson is conventionally called the first modern novelist because Pamela and Clarissa developed psychological characterisation…

• A. Francis Bacon
• B. Geoffery Chaucer
• C. King Alfred the Great
• D. Henry Fielding

Explanation: Henry Fielding is commonly called the father of the English novel because of the scope, realism and narrative technique of works such as…

• A. Jane Austen
• B. Charles Dickens
• C. Sir Walter Scott
• D. Oliver Goldsmith

Explanation: The Talisman is a historical novel by Sir Walter Scott, set during the Third Crusade.

• A. 1000 years ago
• B. 1500 years ago
• C. 2000 years ago
• D. 3000 years ago

Explanation: Julius Caesar died in 44 BCE, so he lived roughly 2,000 years ago. The question is historical rather than literary, but option c is the…

• A. Jane Eyre
• B. Ramona
• C. Emma
• D. Rebecca

Explanation: Emma is Jane Austen’s novel about the clever but misguided Emma Woodhouse and her attempts at matchmaking.

• A. Thackeray
• B. Hardy
• C. Dickens
• D. W. Scott

Explanation: Charles Dickens is especially famous for making London a vivid setting and almost a character in his novels, including Oliver Twist, Bleak…

• A. Jules Verne
• B. Christopher Marlowe
• C. Charles Kingsley
• D. Thomas Hood

Explanation: Jules Verne wrote the adventure novel Around the World in Eighty Days, published in 1872.

• A. John Milton
• B. Charles Dickens
• C. John Webster
• D. Daniel Defoe

Explanation: Charles Dickens wrote both Hard Times and A Tale of Two Cities. Milton and Webster are chiefly associated with poetry and drama, while…

• A. The Luminaries
• B. Wolf Hall
• C. The White Tiger
• D. The Sea

Explanation: Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries won the 2013 Man Booker Prize. It was notable for making Catton the youngest winner at that time.

• A. Shelley
• B. Tolstoy
• C. Byron
• D. Dostoyevsky

Explanation: Crime and Punishment is Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s psychological novel about guilt, conscience, and redemption.

• A. Architect
• B. Engraver
• C. Sculptor
• D. None of these

Explanation: Thomas Hardy was trained as an architect under the architect John Hicks before turning fully to literature.

• A. Dickens
• B. Thackeray
• C. Scott
• D. Fielding

Explanation: Vanity Fair is William Makepeace Thackeray’s satirical novel about society, ambition, and social climbing.

• A. Roots
• B. Ulysses
• C. Tom Jones
• D. Rebecca

Explanation: James Joyce’s best-known novel is Ulysses, published in 1922 and famous for its modernist style and parallels with Homer’s Odyssey.

• A. Somerset Maugham
• B. James Joyce
• C. W.B. Yeats
• D. Philip Sydney

Explanation: Of Human Bondage is a partly autobiographical Bildungsroman by W. Somerset Maugham, following Philip Carey’s emotional and intellectual…

• A. Henry James's "The Ambassadors"
• B. Thomas Hardy's "Tess of the D'Urbervilles"
• C. E.M. Forster's "A Room With A View"
• D. Virginia Woolf's "Mrs. Dalloway"

Explanation: Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles was published in 1891, so it belongs to the nineteenth century.

• A. A week
• B. 24 hours
• C. A lifetime
• D. 6 months

Explanation: The action of Joyce’s Ulysses takes place mainly on 16 June 1904, within a single day in Dublin.

• A. Samuel Johnson
• B. Henry Fielding
• C. John Donne
• D. Tobias Smollett

Explanation: Tom Jones, published in 1749, is the major comic novel by Henry Fielding.