This week’s questions:
1) What city is known as “the city of a thousand minarets”? How about “the city of a hundred spires”?
2) What was the original meaning of the word terrific?
3) What 1997 blockbuster film was the first movie to have two performers nominated for Oscars for their portrayals of the same character?
4) Which U.S. president raised money to redecorate the White House by auctioning off presidential artifacts–including a pair of Abraham Lincoln’s trousers?
5) Why is Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 47 in G Major known as the Palindrome Symphony?
This week’s answers:
1) Minarets: Cairo, Egypt; spires: Prague, Czech Republic
2) It meant “frightening” back in the 17th century, but by the early 19th century it had come to mean “very great or severe,” as in a terrific pain or terrific explosion.
3) Titanic. Kate Winslet and Gloria Stuart were both nominated for their portrayals of Rose.
4) Chester A. Arthur, in 1882. Other items auctioned off included 24 wagonloads of furniture and 30 barrels of china.
5) Because the third movement is the musical equivalent of a palindrome–it’s the same played forward and backward.