Well, by George, Bobbie - you got there, with Annette and Cynthia nipping at your heels. TM, really, I t hought you'd get one or two, but not seven - lol. George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 - 2 November 1950) was an Irish playwright and a co-founder of the London School of Economics. Although his first profitable writing was music and literary criticism, in which capacity he wrote many highly articulate pieces of journalism, his main talent was for drama, and he wrote more than 60 plays. He is the only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize in Literature (1925) and an Oscar (1938), for his contributions to literature and for his work on the film Pygmalion (adaptation of his play of the same name), respectively. Shaw turned down all other awards and honours, including the offer of a knighthood. Sir Michael Philip "Mick" Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English musician, singer, songwriter and actor, best known as the lead vocalist and a founder member of the Rolling Stones. Jagger studied business courses at the London School of Economics, and had seriously considered becoming either a journalist or a politician, comparing the latter to a pop star. Jagger's career has spanned over 50 years, and he has been described as "one of the most popular and influential frontmen in the history of rock & roll". In 1989 Jagger was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and in 2004 into the UK Music Hall of Fame with the Rolling Stones. Multiple Silver, Gold and Platinum albums and records. Kevin Spacey, CBE (born Kevin Spacey Fowler; July 26, 1959) is an American actor, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. He began his career as a stage actor during the 1980s, before being cast in supporting roles in film and television. He gained critical acclaim in the early 1990s, culminating in his first Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for The Usual Suspects (1995), followed by an Academy Award for Best Actor for American Beauty . During a career which has earned Spacey several Emmy and Golden Globe nominations, his other starring roles include Seven (1995), L.A. Confidential (1997), Pay It Forward (2000), K-PAX (2001), and Superman Returns (2006). He was the artistic director of the Old Vic theatre in London from 2004 to 2014. He currently stars as Frank Underwood in the Netflix series House of Cards. Sandra Annette Bullock (born July 26, 1964) is an American actress and producer. She rose to fame in the 1990s with roles in films such as Demolition Man (1993), Speed (1994), The Net (1995), While You Were Sleeping (1995), A Time to Kill (1996), and Hope Floats (1998). In the new millennium, Bullock starred in Miss Congeniality (2000), Two Weeks Notice (2002), The Lake House (2006), and the critically acclaimed Crash (2004) and Gravity (2013). Bullock had initially turned down the role of Leigh Anne Tuohy in The Blind Side three times due to a discomfort with portraying a devout Christian. She was awarded the Academy Award for Best Actress, Golden Globe Award for Best Actress Motion Picture Drama, Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role and Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress. The Blind Side also received an Academy Award for Best Picture nomination. So, there is our foursome!! Fearsome, huh?? I think so. So, for Bobbie: For Cynthia: And for Annette: Thanks to all for my Birthday wishes and for playing. See you next week. Now I'm off to check out Cynthia's question!! Nancy.

Zowie, wowie, you guys did a great job on this one. ***** Five gold stars for Martha, Patti, Steven, Eduarda, and Edna. Annette - you may deserve stars too, but I couldn't tell if, in your second post, you had just remembered the answer, or if you had looked it up. If the former, well, grab some gold stars ***** for yourself. Thanks for contributing more Churchill quotes. I didn't know he was the wit who gave us no good deed goes unpunished, one of my favorites also. I hope you all had a nice weekend. Thanks for playing. ThinMan

Frieda - The Siege of Krishnapur would be in the OK category for me. Nothing special, but not bad either. I've got a bit of a soft spot for it, though, as it was the last one I needed to get to complete my collection, so I was very pleased when I found a nice copy on ABE and the parcel arrived through the door. It's a while since I read The Sea, The Sea so I don't remember the particular scene that you mention - obviously it didn't strike me in the same way as it did you. Life of Pi is most certainly not a fantasy, and it doesn't have any talking animals. Part of the pleasure of the book is the unsentimental way that animals are treated. Here's my review of it from the RP review thread we did a few years ago. (I think I might try reviving that...) ================================================== This is one of the few times when a Booker Prize winner lives up to the type. I've rarely enjoyed a book so much. It's not a difficult read, but it's got enough in it to make anyone think. It's full of little twists, and some lovely touches of humour. It's the story of a sixteen-year-old boy called Pi (as in 3.14159 - you'll have to read the story to find out why!). He and his family are on a cargo ship on it's way to Canada, carrying several large zoo animals; the ship is shipwrecked, and Pi finds himself on a lifeboat with a zebra with a broken leg, a hyena, an orang-utan - and a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Which makes for a bit of a tense atmosphere.... It really is one of those books where I envy anyone coming to it for the first time. I'm sure I'll read it again soon. Here's just a few extracts that particularly appealed to me. I hope they give a flavour of the book, without giving anything away. It was my first clue that atheists are my brothers and sisters of a different faith, and every word they speak speaks of faith, Like me, they go as far as the legs of reason will carry them - and then they leap. I'll be honest about it. It's not atheists that stick in my craw, but agnostics. Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the Garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" then surely we are permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation. I am not one to hold a prejudice against any animal, but it is a plain fact that the spotted hyena is not well served by it's appearance. It is ugly beyond redemption. He's petulant! It's morning in Bethany and God's hungry; God wants His breakfast. He comes to a fig tree. It's not the season for figs, so the tree has no figs. God is peeved. The Son mutters, "May you never bear fruit again," and instantly the fig tree withers. So says Matthew, backed up by Mark. My fellow castaway came into view. He raised himself on...

Here is an exerpt from the official Booker Man site: "The prize, which celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2008 after launching in 1969, aims to promote the finest in fiction by rewarding the best novel of the year written by a citizen of the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland." Okay.........WHY change the whole premise? I understand the " every kid is equal and every one has to get a trophy" epidemic that seems to be sweeping our country ...but let's leave some things alone.