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Nonfiction Books Quiz

Guess the authors of these famous nonfiction books.
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: April 8, 2015
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First submittedNovember 22, 2012
Times taken20,082
Average score43.5%
Rating4.49
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Book
Author
Das Kapital
Karl Marx
On the Origin of Species
Charles Darwin
The Tipping Point
Malcolm Gladwell
In Cold Blood
Truman Capote
Mein Kampf
Adolf Hitler
The Diary of a Young Girl
Anne Frank
Guns, Germs, and Steel
Jared Diamond
Cosmos
Carl Sagan
A Brief History of Time
Stephen Hawking
The Wealth of Nations
Adam Smith
Unsafe at Any Speed
Ralph Nader
Gorillas in the Mist
Dian Fossey
Book
Author
The Selfish Gene
Richard Dawkins
The Feminine Mystique
Betty Friedan
The Double Helix
James Watson
The Prince
Niccolò Machiavelli
The Interpretation of Dreams
Sigmund Freud
The Republic
Plato
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
Edward Gibbon
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test
Tom Wolfe
Mere Christianity
C.S. Lewis
Principia Mathematica (1687)
Isaac Newton
The Art of War
Sun Tzu
26 Comments
+1
Level 55
Nov 21, 2012
The Jungle is fiction, but the setting was very realistic.
+1
Level 54
Nov 21, 2012
It's not accepting it when I type in Tzu
+1
Level 93
Feb 1, 2019
That is his given name not the family name
+3
Level 65
May 2, 2019
Tzu is an honorific title, meaning master or sage.
+1
Level 26
Nov 21, 2012
I agree with THobbes--The Jungle is based on some truth, but it is an entirely fictional story.
+1
Level ∞
Nov 22, 2012
Removed that question. Thanks.
+1
Level 62
Jun 3, 2015
Did poorly but excellent quiz. Thanks to the author
+1
Level 74
Jun 3, 2015
I scored less than half, but I enjoyed it, too. I need the hard ones to teach this old dog new tricks.
+1
Level 74
Jun 3, 2015
I always hear the book referred to as, "Plato's Republic". When I saw just The Republic, it didn't even dawn on me that was the actual name of the book. Duh.
+3
Level 69
Jun 7, 2015
Why for instance 'das kapital' and 'mein kampf' and not 'il principe', 'sūnzĭ bīngfǎ' or 'traumdeutung'? Seems a bit inconsistent and even confusing for non-native english speakers. The prince almost tripped me up.
+3
Level 69
Aug 7, 2016
It's the custom; I've personally never heard either of those two former titles translated (wouldn't even know how to, actually) and never heard of the latter one referred to untranslated, as "il principe" which I've also never heard of. Don't ask me why, it's just how people know it :P
+2
Level 30
Aug 29, 2016
My struggle and The capital (Capital: Critique of Political Economy.)
+1
Level 78
May 13, 2022
Sure, but that's not how they're generally published in English.
+1
Level 85
Jul 21, 2015
Made it easier that I had a copy of "The Prince" sitting next to me and I could check the spelling.
+2
Level 30
Aug 29, 2016
Mein Kamf is fiction.
+2
Level 83
Sep 15, 2016
How do you define fiction? I always thought it was a political manifesto. (Never read it though.)
+5
Level 86
Apr 8, 2020
It's an autobiography. So sure, some of it is fiction, but it's not a work of fiction.
+1
Level 82
Sep 19, 2016
Good list. Was pleased to see Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test - a book that should be better known.
+1
Level 86
Jan 28, 2020
Funny to see ones on here that are still famous, but have been widely discredited/debunked.
+3
Level 59
Jun 5, 2020
There is also a "The Art of War" by Machiavelli
+1
Level 56
Oct 22, 2020
Good quizz ! :)

Perhaps we could avoid to put A.F book just after Mein Kampf … Thx

+1
Level 72
Sep 18, 2021
Love the quiz - just a side note; Cosmos is also the name of Alexander von Humboldt's magnum opus
+1
Level 91
Jun 25, 2022
The republic is a literary fiction
+1
Level 23
Aug 12, 2023
literally had a school assignment about Machiavellian characters in films a few weeks ago. Wouldn't have known who Machiavelli was if it wasn't for that.
+3
Level 77
Sep 21, 2023
Only 15% got Gibbons for the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire? Didn't know this website's users were 85% women.
+1
Level 82
Dec 26, 2023
lol I've never read it but I see it at the bookstore often enough and it's memorably intimidating