Literary life: nature named after writers – quiz

A species of brittle star has officially been named Ophiohamus georgemartini, because of its physical likeness to the thorny crown on the cover of the second book in the Game of Thrones series, A Clash of Kings. Martin was thrilled, if a bit unnerved by the news: “It is all very Lovecraftian. But I’m flattered. And bemused,” he wrote on his website on Thursday.

Countless authors and writers have been honoured to in this way, with plants, stars, even mortuaries named after them (what a lucky crime writer Val McDermid is). But how well do you know your author patronyms?

1. 

   Which writer was this butterfly named after?

   1. Virginia Woolf

   2. Vladimir Nabokov

   3. Leo Tolstoy

   4. Nathanael West

2. 

   Who was this extinct sperm whale named after?

   1. Robert Louis Stevenson

   2. Joseph Conrad

   3. Jules Verne

   4. Herman Melville

3. 

   Which author was this bee named after?

   1. Noam Chomsky

   2. Howard Zinn

   3. Naomi Klein

   4. Bertrand Russell

4. 

   Which author had a strand of Legionella named after him?

   1. George Orwell

   2. Miguel de Cervantes

   3. Oscar Wilde

   4. William Shakespeare

5. 

   Which science fiction writer was this dinosaur named after?

   1. Michael Crichton

   2. Philip K Dick

   3. Isaac Asimov

   4. Arthur C Clarke

6. 

   Whose name does this hummingbird carry?

   1. Ovid

   2. Sappho

   3. Horace

   4. Euripides

7. 

   Whose name was given to this turtle?

   1. Terry Pratchett

   2. John Connolly

   3. Michael Ende

   4. Douglas Adams

8. 

   Which classic author is this Pterosaur named after?

   1. Sylvia Plath

   2. Charles Dickens

   3. Robert Louis Stevenson

   4. Arthur Conan Doyle

9. 

   This beetle is named after Charles Darwin and which famously funny writer?

   1. Evelyn Waugh

   2. David Sedaris

   3. Stella Gibbons

   4. Laurence Sterne

10. 

    Which author is this schizomid named after?

    1. Stephen King

    2. Bram Stoker

    3. Edgar Allan Poe

    4. HP Lovecraft

Solutions

1:B - This butterfly of the lycaenidae family is called Nabokovia, named after Vladimir Nabokov. It's only one of the butterflies and moths named after the Russian-American author he loved and studied them throughout his life., 2:D - This sperm whale, the Livyatan melvillei, was named after Moby Dick creator Herman Melville. It lived approximately 12 million years ago., 3:A - This is a Megachile chomskyi newly described in 2013, it was named after American linguist, philosopher, historian and activist Noam Chomsky., 4:D - The Legionella shakespearei is a bacterium which was isolated from a cooling tower in Stratford-upon-Avon – hence, it bearing the same name as a certain author of the same pastures., 5:A - This herbivorous dinousaur, which lived in the Cretaceous era, was named for Michael Crichton, the author of Jurassic Park. In this digital recreation, a Crichtonsaurus crosses paths with a pair of frogs., 6:B - Introducing the hummingbird Sappho sparganurus, also known as red-tailed comet. Found in the central Andes of Bolivia and Argentina, it was named after Sappho, Greek lyric poet from Lesbos who lived in the 7th century BC., 7:A - This is a recreation of a Psephophorus terrypratchetti, named after novelist Terry Pratchett in honour of his fondness for turtles., 8:D - Arthurdactylus conandoylei was named after the Sherlock Holmes author. A specimen was found in a jungle similar to the one in Doyle's novel The Lost World, about a professor finding prehistoric animals alive on a plateau in South America., 9:B - Darwinilus sedarisi, a rare beetle specimen collected by Charles Darwin was identified as a new species in 2014, 180 years after the naturalist found it. The genus is named after Darwin, while also honouring David Sedaris., 10:B - Draculoides bramstokeri was named after the Dracula author by Dr Mark Harvey in Western Australia, because: "If you squint your eyes a lot they kind of look like Dracula's fangs."

Scores

1. 4 and above.

   Oh dear, they won't be naming much after you. Try again?

2. 7 and above.

   Pretty good job!

3. 0 and above.

   Oh dear, they won't be naming much after you. Try again?

4. 10 and above.

   They should name something after you!