Episode 6 University Challenge

'Asking the questions, Jeremy Paxman.'

Hello. Last time, we played the final first-round match

in this seasonal version of University Challenge

for former students. The four highest-scoring teams

are through to the semifinals.

Next time we'll see Magdalen College, Oxford play Trinity College, Cambridge.

The graduates from Edinburgh University tonight

include a weather forecaster, a politician,

a television presenter and an entomologist.

They beat Durham in the first round by 135 points to 60,

and although they didn't know much about Jacques Derrida,

and, indeed, why should they, they made up for it

by telling us about writers' houses, the poetry of Milton

and Winston Churchill's views on modern art. Let's meet them again.

Hello. I'm Kirsty McCabe. I graduated from Edinburgh

with a degree in geophysics in '97, and I now get up very early,

3:30 in the morning, to present the weather on ITV Breakfast.

I'm David Steel, and I took arts and law degrees in the early '60s,

and I found constitutional law quite useful in Parliament.

-Their captain.

-I'm Sally Magnusson.

I'm a graduate in English from Edinburgh University in 1978.

I'm a TV news presenter and occasional author

of such weighty tomes as Life Of Pee. LAUGHTER

I'm George McGavin. I took a degree in zoology

which I completed in '75. I went to the ivory towers of Oxford,

but now I'm in the real world of broadcasting.

APPLAUSE

The graduates from the University of Warwick

include a film director, a teacher,

an expert on British transport and an actor.

They gave a very spirited performance in the first round

and came away with a joint highest score in that stage of the contest,

225 points against the 50 earned by a team from Sheffield

who looked as if they wished they'd stayed there.

Warwick shone on everything, from British theatre

to Shakespearean metaphors and Thomas Paine to William Blake.

Let's meet them again.

Hi. I'm Vadim Jean. I graduated in 1986, got a degree in history,

and I'm now a film and TV director and producer.

Hi. I'm Daisy Christodoulou. I graduated from Warwick

with a degree in English literature in 2007,

and I work as an English teacher in London.

-And their captain.

-Hi. I'm Christian Wolmar.

I graduated in 1971 with a degree in economics.

I'm a journalist specialising in transport matters,

and I also write books about railway history.

Hi. I'm Carla Mendonca. I graduated from Warwick in 1983

with a degree in theatre studies and dramatic art, and I'm an actress.

APPLAUSE

The rules are unchanging, so fingers on the buzzers.

Here's your first starter for 10. A collection of poems by TS Eliot,

the most famous creation of PG Wodehouse,

the son of a Biblical patriarch, a film of 1961

directed by Bryan Forbes and the faded screen icon Norma Desmond

have all provided the base for stage works

by which British composer?

Britten?

No. Edinburgh? You may not confer. One of you may buzz.

-Vaughan Williams?

-No, it's Andrew Lloyd Webber!

-Cats, Jeeves, Joseph and so on.

-LAUGHTER

10 points for this. What two-word term refers to a 14th-century theologian

and is generally used to denote the principle "Entia non sunt" -

-Occam. Occam's Razor.

-That's correct, yes.

Your bonuses are on Shakespeare's twins, Warwick.

What is the name of Viola's twin brother in Twelfth Night,

whom she believes to be dead?

-Sebastian.

-Correct.

Which play features two pairs of identical twins,

Antipholus and Dromio of Syracuse and Antipholus and Dromio of Ephesus?

-Comedy Of Errors.

-Correct. Shakespeare himself had twins.

-The girl was named Judith. Who was the boy, who died aged 11?

-Hamnet.

-Hamnet.

-Hamnet is correct, yes.

10 points for this. "Dear Ken,

your book was very useful to me."

Which British writer wrote those words in 1981

to thank the Australian Ken Welsh

for inspiring the title of his novel?

Welsh was the author of a popular guide

on low-budget travel around Europe.

-Bill Bryson.

-No.

Warwick?

-Douglas Adams?

-Correct, yes.

Your bonuses now are on three-letter British place names.

In each case, name the place from the description.

First, a market town in Suffolk. Its name means "island"

or "dry ground in a marsh", and it shares its spelling

-with that of an organ of the body.

-An organ of the body?

Ely's in Cambridgeshire. An organ of the body?

Three letters, Suffolk. Was it Suffolk?

-Organ of the body.

-Ear?

-Ear.

-No, it's Eye.

A river and town in Monmouthshire,

birthplace of the naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace.

River and town. Hay?

-Or Wye.

-Hay or Wye.

-Haye.

-No, it's Usk.

And finally, a royal borough on the Firth of Clyde,

strongly associated with Robert Burns.

That's Ayr.

That's Ayr.

-Ayr.

-Ayr's correct, yes.

10 points at stake for this starter question.

Along with sloths and armadillos, which insectivorous mammals

are classified as edentata, meaning "with no teeth"?

They have tubular muzzles, and...

-Anteaters.

-Correct.

Right. Your bonuses, Edinburgh, are on band names.

For five points, the final four words

of a Hull furniture-shop slogan

gave Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt the name of a band

that had three UK top-10 hits in the mid-1990s.

The slogan ran, "For your bedroom needs,

we sell"...what?

Bedroom needs, we sell...

-Beds.

-THEY LAUGH

-Dreams?

-Dreams?

Dreams?

-Dreamers?

-No. It's Everything But The Girl.

Secondly, which band from Bury in Lancashire

were originally called Mr Soft? They changed the name

to a five-letter word described as "the most sensuous word in the English language"

during an episode of The Singing Detective.

-A sensuous word?

-Oh!

The most sensuous in the language.

THEY WHISPER

-Insect.

-George thinks it might be insect,

but I think not. LAUGHTER

No. It's Elbow. And finally, originating in Nevada,

which band took their name from a fictional band

in a New Order video, and have an official fan club

-known as The Victims?

-That's Spinal Tap, isn't it?

-Spinal Tap.

-No. It's The Killers.

Right. We're going to take a picture round.

You're going to see the starting layout

of a common variant of the card game patience or solitaire.

10 points if you can give me its name.

If you buzz you must answer. I'm sorry. Edinburgh?

Patience.

No. I told you it was patience.

No, it's Klondike, but you gave the wrong answer, both of you,

so a picture bonus shortly. Another starter question now.

10 points for this. Sterling silver is an alloy

of 92.5 percent silver with, most commonly, which other element

that serves to harden the metal?

-Copper?

-Copper is right. Yes.

So you get the picture bonuses, Warwick.

They're three more starting layouts of patience.

Five points for each you can identify.

Firstly for five, this two-deck game.

Two-deck... Um, it's not Klondike...

-Poker patience?

-Yeah, go for it.

-Poker patience?

-No, it's Sultan, or Sultan of Turkey.

You've got to build a harem around the kings, apparently.

Secondly, this two-deck game.

Two-deck game...

THEY WHISPER

-Spider. Try that.

-Spider?

No. That's Miss Milligan. And finally this single-deck game.

-Clockwork.

-No, no, no.

Just clock.

-Clock.

-Clock patience is right, yes.

Another starter question. A concordance of Shakespeare's plays

reveals that the word "melt" appears most frequently

in which play, as in "The crown of the earth doth melt"

and "Let Rome in Tiber melt"?

-Antony And Cleopatra.

-Correct.

Your bonuses are on geologists, Warwick.

Born in 1790, the English geologist Gideon Mantell

is remembered for giving what name to a dinosaur

that possessed a broad, stiff tail and a thumb developed into a spike?

THEY WHISPER

A stegosaur?

Not tyrannosaur. Stegosaurus, maybe?

-Stegosaurus?

-No. It was an iguanodon.

In The Principles Of Geology, who popularised the theory

that rocks are formed by slow, continual processes?

His works were a great influence on Charles Darwin.

-THEY WHISPER

-Lyell. Correct. Sir Charles Lyell.

Harry Blackmore Whittington, who died in 2010,

is noted for his paper on which Palaeozoic marine arthropod,

distinguished by its flattened oval body?

THEY WHISPER

THEY WHISPER

Duck-billed platypus?

-Duck-billed platypus?

-No, trilobites. 10 points for this.

What nationality links the common names of a giant extinct deer

of the genus Megaloceros and four breeds of dog -

a water spaniel, a terrier, a setter and a wolfhound?

-Irish. Ireland.

-Yes.

Your bonuses now, Edinburgh.

They're on 17th-century England. Although not its prime instigator,

which minister of Charles II gives his name

to a code of laws that reinforced the established Church

and restricted the activity of Protestant dissenters?

THEY WHISPER

-We do not know.

-It's Clarendon, the Clarendon Code.

Sharing its name with an act of 1559,

which act required clergy to consent to everything in The Book Of Common Prayer

and to be ordained according to the rites of the Church of England?

Unification?

-Unification.

-Try it.

-Unification?

-No, it's the Act of Uniformity.

Nearly there. Clarendon fell from power after military setbacks

in a war of 1665 to '67.

Which commercial rival of England was the principal adversary in that war?

Scotland?

THEY WHISPER

France, Spain or Scotland.

Take your pick.

-Take your pick.

-Come on!

-Spain?

-No. It's the Netherlands. 10 points for this.

Which country consists of several islands in the Baltic Sea,

some of the North Frisian islands in the North Sea -

I'm sorry. If you buzz, you must answer.

-Yeah. Yeah. Finland.

-No. You're wrong, as well,

and you lose five points. And most of the Jutland Peninsula.

One of you may buzz, Edinburgh. You may not confer!

One of you may buzz.

-Poland.

-Poland?

No. It's Denmark. You had a lucky escape there, Warwick.

10 points for this. Blue Mauritius, Tyrian Plum,

IR Official and Inverted Jenny are all rare examples

of which collector's items?

-Stamps.

-Stamps is right. Postage stamps, yes.

Your bonuses, Warwick, are on the novels of Ian McEwan.

Identify the novel from the description of its main character.

Henry Perowne, a 48-year-old neurosurgeon

in a novel described as "a post 9/11 variation

of Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway"?

-Saturday.

-Yes. Michael Beard, secondly, a Nobel Laureate

devoted to womanising, inordinate consumption of food and drink

and averting of climate change.

-Solar.

-Correct.

Briony Tallis, who at the start of the novel is 13 years old

and writing a play for her brother Leon.

-Atonement.

-Correct.

10 points for this. The Nidd, the Ayr, the Wharfe and the Don

are all tributaries of which major river...

-The Nevsky.

-No. You lose five points.

Which major river that joins the Trent

east of Goole to form the Humber?

No, you may not confer. One of you may buzz.

-Ouse?

-The Ouse is correct. The Yorkshire Ouse.

Right. A set of bonuses for you,

this time on the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Which former tennis player of the 1960s and '70s,

one of the first openly gay sports stars,

received the Medal of Freedom in 2009,

having championed gender-equality issues

in sport and other areas of life?

THEY WHISPER Was it King?

THEY WHISPER

Is it not Mrs King? Billie Jean King?

Oh, Billie Jean King. Yeah.

-We think Billie Jean King.

-Correct.

Which recipient of the medal was a Supreme Court justice

from 1981 until her retirement in 2006?

She was the first woman to hold that position.

Oh! THEY WHISPER

THEY WHISPER AND LAUGH

-We've forgotten her name. Sorry.

-Sandra Day O'Connor.

And finally, which political figure was murdered in 1978

and received the medal posthumously? His life as a gay-rights activist

was the subject of a film of 2008.

THEY WHISPER

It's gone. We're past it.

-LAUGHTER

-It's Harvey Milk.

We're going to take a music round now.

For your starter, you'll hear a piece of classical music.

10 points if you can give me the name of the composer.

STIRRING ORCHESTRAL AND CHORAL MUSIC

Wagner.

No. You can hear a little more, Edinburgh.

MUSIC CONTINUES

Tchaikovsky?

No, it's Berlioz. It's from Romeo And Juliet.

Music bonuses shortly. Here's another starter question.

Produced in bone marrow and found in the blood of all mammals,

which small, disc-like structures are important factors in stopping -

-Platelets.

-Correct.

So, we'll pick up with the music bonuses.

Berlioz's Romeo And Juliet, which was the starter question,

is an example of a choral symphony,

a term Berlioz himself coined to describe the work.

Your bonuses are three more excerpts from choral symphonies.

Simply name the composer in each case.

MAJESTIC CHORAL MUSIC

THEY WHISPER

THEY SPEAK UNDER MUSIC

-Faure.

-No, it's Liszt.

It's the final chorus from the Faust Symphony. Secondly...

ROUSING MALE-VOICE CHORAL MUSIC

-THEY WHISPER

-Could be Rimsky-Korsakov.

Feels more like Tchaikovsky.

-Tchaikovsky?

-No, that's Shostakovich, from his Symphony No. 13.

And finally...

DRAMATIC CHORAL MUSIC

-THEY WHISPER

-It's Russian.

-Tchaikovsky again.

-Tchaikovsky?

No, that's Mahler. Right, 10 points for this.

Published in 1591, five years after his death,

Astrophel And Stella -

-Sir Philip Sidney.

-Correct.

Right, Warwick. This set of bonuses are on shorter words

that may be made from the eight-letter word "broccoli".

Give each word from the definition.

An Italian word meaning liveliness, dash, vigour or spirit.

-Brio.

-Brio.

Correct. Secondly, a programming language

created by Grace Hopper and others in 1959

and intended for use in commerce.

THEY WHISPER

A commerce code... Something "co".

Could it end in "co", maybe?

Loco?

-Loco?

-No. It's COBOL.

And finally, an attack of severe spasmodic pain in the abdomen.

-Um... Colic.

-Colic.

Correct. 10 points for this. The orbit of which planet

has the least pronounced eccentricity -

that is, its orbit is most nearly a true circle?

-Mercury.

-Anyone like to buzz from Edinburgh?

-Earth.

-No, it's Venus. 10 points for this.

Listen carefully. Two groups have had three successive Christmas number-one hit singles,

the former in the 1960s, the latter in the 1990s.

For 10 points, name each of them.

-The Beatles and the Spice Girls.

-Correct.

Warwick, your bonuses this time are on a European ruler.

In 1279, Diniz, nicknamed "the Farmer",

succeeded his father, Alfonso III, to become the sixth king

of which present-day European country?

THEY WHISPER

Um, Portugal? No, you'd know if it were Portugal.

-Um...

-No.

-But it is a present-day country.

THEY WHISPER

-Italy?

-No, it was Portugal.

Portugal's first university, founded by Diniz in Lisbon in 1290,

later moved to which city? It now gives its name to a group

of leading European research universities.

THEY WHISPER

Cadiz? Porto?

-Porto?

-No, it's Coimbra. Finally, Diniz's correspondence in 1308

with which English king is often cited

as the first commercial treaty between the two countries?

Um, I think that's Henry IV. I think it's Henry IV.

Henry IV. No, it's Edward II. 10 points for this.

In finance, what Italian-derived term

refers to unsecured, higher-yielding loans

that are often used to fund takeovers?

In more general usage, it denotes a low storey

between two others in a building -

-Mezzanine.

-Mezzanine is right, yes.

Your bonuses are on tributaries of the River Thames.

Give the tributary whose name corresponds to the following.

A surname shared by two US literary figures,

authors of the 1895 novel The Red Badge Of Courage

and the 1930 poem, The Bridge.

Crane.

THEY WHISPER

THEY WHISPER It's not Emerson, is it?

Come on. Let's have it, please.

-Crane.

-Correct.

The second half of the name of the ship

that carried the first large group of West Indian immigrants to the UK

-after World War II.

-Windrush.

-Windrush.

-Correct. And finally, the chilled-out entertainer

of the fictional company Wernham Hogg.

Oh, that's David Brent.

-Brent.

-Brent is correct, yes.

We're going to take a second picture round.

You will see a painting depicting a scene from a romantic poem.

For 10 points, name the poem.

-The Lady Of Shalott?

-No.

One of you may buzz, Edinburgh. You may not confer.

Morte d'Arthur?

No. It's La Belle Dame Sans Merci, by Keats.

So your picture bonuses will be retained

until someone gets a starter question right.

Listen carefully. What is the present name of the English city

whose Roman name is an anagram of the television channel

formerly known as UKTV G2

and renamed because, allegedly, everyone knows a bloke of this name?

Well, I know it's Dave, is the channel.

That wasn't what I asked for. Warwick?

-Is it "Veda", Chester?

-It is Chester. Correct. Yes.

You get the picture bonuses. Three more paintings

based on the poetry of John Keats. I want the name of the poem

each takes as its subject. Firstly, for five...

Do you have any ideas?

THEY WHISPER

-Eve Of St Agnes.

-No. It's Isabella, or The Pot Of Basil.

Secondly...

THEY WHISPER

Eve Of St Agnes.

No, that's Lamia. And finally...

-THEY LAUGH

-Go for it. Go on.

-You've got to.

-Eve Of St Agnes.

-Well done!

-LAUGHTER AND CHEERING

10 points for this starter.

The Chinese Feng Bo, the Hindu and Vedic Indian Vayu,

the Guatemalan Huracan and the Greek Boreas

are among deities -

-The wind.

-The wind is correct, yes.

Bonuses on industrial chemistry for you lucky things.

A term denoting the process by which rubber is heated with sulphur

to produce a more durable form such as ebonite

is derived from the name of which Roman god?

Vulcan. Correct. In oil refining, what term is used for the process

by which heavy, long-chain hydrocarbons

are broken into lighter, shorter-chain molecules

either by heat or by catalysis?

SHE WHISPERS

-Heat...

-THEY WHISPER

THEY WHISPER

-Petrolification?

-No. It's cracking.

What basic inorganic chemical is produced

in the Castner-Kellner process of electrolysis of sodium chloride?

Salt?

No, no, no. An inorganic chemical.

-No. That is sodium chloride.

-Oil... Sodium...

-Calcium carbonate?

-No. Sodium hydroxide, or caustic soda.

Four minutes to go. 10 points for this.

Which contemporary novelist's name is composed of the given names of the fourth-century Roman emperor

known as The Apostate, and of the engineer who devised the bouncing bomb?

You may not confer.

-Julian Barnes.

-Julian Barnes is correct, yes.

A set of bonuses on English history.

Name the kings during whose reigns the following plots and rebellions took place.

The Barons' War, in which Simon de Montfort was a major figure.

Was it Henry II?

-Simon de Montfort was the guy who went to France...

-It's Henry III.

De Montfort. I think it's Henry. I think it's Henry III.

-Henry III?

-Correct. The Southampton Plot,

which aimed to replace the king with the Earl of March.

Conspirators were executed for treason

shortly before the king sailed for France.

-Edward II. No, no, no.

-Was it Charles?

Do you think it's Charles? I was thinking Edward I.

Come on. Let's have it, please.

-Edward I.

-No, it was Henry V.

Finally, the Pilgrimage of Grace, a widespread northern rising

-against the king's religious policies.

-Henry VIII.

Henry VIII. Correct. Another starter question now.

Which Mediterranean island was held successively

by the Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans and Arabs,

until, in 1090, it was conquered by...

-Malta.

-Malta is right, yes.

Your bonuses this time are on a bird.

In Act I of Macbeth, which bird is described by Lady Macbeth

as that which "croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan

-under my battlements"?

-Raven?

-Maybe Raven.

-Raven.

Correct. Which Roman statesman, whose speeches against Marc Antony cost him his life,

was reputedly forewarned of his death by the fluttering of ravens?

Is it Cicero?

-I don't think he was executed.

-Cassius?

-Cassius?

-No. It was Cicero. In Christian art,

the raven is an emblem of God's providence,

an allusion to the ravens that fed which Old Testament prophet

-during his time in the wilderness?

-THEY WHISPER

-Was it Moses?

-Isaiah?

-Isaiah.

-No, it's Elijah. 10 points for this.

If their surnames are arranged alphabetically,

who comes first among the British prime ministers

of the 20th century?

Callaghan.

No. Warwick?

-Asquith.

-Of course. Yes.

You get the bonuses, this time on Maurice Ravel.

Ravel wrote the music for which Diaghilev ballet

first performed in 1912, of a tale of love between a goatherd and a shepherd?

Something and something.

THEY WHISPER

Come on.

-No.

-Daphnis and Chloe. Secondly, the author of the Claudine books

and Gigi, who wrote the libretto for Ravel's 1925 opera

L'enfant Et Les Sortileges.

-Colette.

-Correct. In 1922, Ravel produced an orchestral version

of which work, originally written as a suite in 10 movements

for piano by Mussorgsky?

-Pictures At A Museum?

-Um...

-Pictures At A Museum?

I'll accept that. It's Pictures At An Exhibition.

10 points for this starter question. Born in 1791,

which scientist was Humphry Davy's assistant

at the Royal Institution?

-Michael Faraday.

-Correct. Another set of bonuses for you.

They're on world geography, the relative areas

of various political entitles.

What is the fourth-largest country in the world?

-China...

-Is it Russia?

-Is it size, or...

-Er, the USA.

Correct. What is the fourth-largest US state?

Texas is probably too big, so after that?

-Montana's very big.

-The north one, the very big one...

-Montana and Nevada. All those...

-Come on.

-Er, Montana.

-Correct.

What is the fourth-largest EU member state?

-Are Germany and France the biggest?

-Spain?

-Italy?

-Spain is the next.

-Poland's big. Poland's probably...

Poland. No, it's Germany. 10 points for this starter question.

Deriving from a Greek word meaning both a pebble and a vote,

what term denotes the -

-Psephology.

-Psephology is correct.

Your bonuses this time are on Christian festivals.

What single word is an alternative name

for the festival held on February 2nd...

-GONG RINGS

-Edinburgh University have 35.

The University of Warwick have 265.

It felt much closer than that.

THEY LAUGH

Not to you, obviously. It did feel much closer than that,

and you're very good sports for taking part, so thank you very much.

Warwick, that is the highest score so far in this series.

Congratulations. We shall look forward to seeing you in the final.

Warwick University will go through, where they'll play the winners of the next fixture,

between Magdalen College, Oxford and Trinity College, Cambridge.

I hope you can join us for that, but now it's goodbye from Edinburgh,

goodbye from Warwick, and it's goodbye from me. Goodbye.

APPLAUSE

MUSIC: I Believe In Father Christmas by Greg Lake

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

E-mail [email protected]

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