The Book That Saved the Earth · Class 10 English · Footprints Without Feet: 135 MCQs with answers

Claire Boiko

The other three appear only in the suggested reading.

It saved the Earth from a Martian invasion

The invasion of 2040 never actually happened.

To bow low before entering

Under Think-Tank's title as Commander-in-Chief.

To contact the probe, so that Earth can be invaded before lunch

He calls Earth a primitive ball of mud.

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Sergeant Oop

The order passed from Omega to Iota to him.

A very large volume of Mother Goose

Omega holds it so that the audience can read the title.

He screamed, held his head, and said it was his own balloon brain

He had boasted about that brain since his first scene.

That one dusty old book of nursery rhymes saved the world

She returns chuckling for the epilogue.

Mother Goose

The play's last joke, delivered straight to the audience.

In the the twentieth-century section of a museum of ancient history

A Historian speaks there directly to the audience.

The twenty-fifth

Four centuries after the events it describes.

There were books on every subject, teaching people how, when, where and why

From ant eaters to Zulus, says the Historian.

They illustrated, they educated, they punctuated and they even decorated

The fourth verb is a joke about books bought for shelves.

An African ethnic group belonging to South Africa

The last subject in the Historian's alphabetical joke.

A noble encyclopedia, a tome about rockets, or a secret file from space

She rules out the impressive answers before showing us the real one.

On a raised box, with a huge egg-shaped head and a starred robe

His arms are folded, and Noodle stands at a switchboard beside him.

An apprentice, standing at an elaborate switchboard

An apprentice works for a period in return for being taught.

Because part of the salutation had been left out

He says so peevishly — that is, irritably.

That Think-Tank rules Mars and her two moons

Noodle runs out of breath before reaching the question.

Who the most fantastically gifted being in the land is

An offstage voice answers, after a pause, that it is him.

That they are ugly creatures with tiny heads

Head size is his whole theory of intelligence.

That exercising his mind may one day give him a balloon brain

He offers it as the highest compliment he can think of.

1 and 2 only

The invasion never happened at all.

The invasion never took place, because a single book prevented it

The Historian says so before the action even starts.

Think-Tank — the Commander-in-Chief with an egg-shaped head

Noodle is an apprentice, and the Historian is an Earthling.

A historian introduces a famous rescue, and we meet the vain ruler who was fooled

The library scene comes next.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include at least seven of: the twenty-fifth-century museum setting and the Historian's direct address; the Era of the Book with the list and the four verbs; the claim that a book saved the Earth and the three kinds of book ruled out; the historiscope and the shift t…

In the Centerville Public Library

Omega calls it simply this square place.

Opening and closing the card catalogue drawers in a confused fashion

Each of the three is confused in a different way.

Opening it, turning it upside down, shaking it and riffling the pages

'Riffling' means quickly turning over the pages.

That it is some sort of storage barn

She has counted two thousand of the peculiar items.

Hats — and the room a haberdashery

He puts one on his head to demonstrate.

A shop selling clothing and small articles of dress such as pins and cotton

Oop's guess, made with a book on his head.

That it was a crude refreshment stand, since Earth creatures are always eating

He calls the question elementary.

Two slices of what is called bread, with some sort of filling between them

He calls it the main staple of Earth diet.

That poor Lieutenant Iota has gone without her breakfast

Iota then finds an excuse of her own.

That she could not be so impolite as to eat before her sergeant

She calls it a very great honour before handing it over.

They salute and tell him to do it for the glory of Mars

He answers unhappily that he will do it immediately.

That it was not delicious, and as dry as Martian dust

He salutes and begins by saying 'that is correct, sir'.

That Earthlings did not eat these objects but used them to communicate

Which is the first hint of what a book actually is.

He asks whether they have marbles in their ears

They bow very low and obey.

That Earthlings opened these objects and watched them

Which gives Think-Tank his third theory.

That they are for eye communication rather than ear communication

Announced as a clarification of Noodle's muddle.

1 and 2 only

Noodle never contradicts anybody directly.

The order passed from Omega to Iota to Oop, who actually ate it

And Oop reported that it was not delicious.

Oop — put a book on his head and suggested a haberdashery

Iota did the counting; Omega was ordered to eat first.

Three Martians cannot identify a book, and their commander guesses three times

The reading comes in the next scene, with vitamins.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include at least seven of: the library setting; what each of the three Martians is doing; Iota's barn and the two thousand items; Oop's hats and haberdashery; the refreshment-stand ruling and the description of a sandwich; the order to eat and its passage down the r…

Little lines and squiggles and dots, thousands of them beside the pictures

An exact description of print by somebody who has never seen any.

Scrawls — illegible writing or markings

Oop's word for the printed text.

Remove vitamins, present vitamins, swallow vitamins

Three military commands for three pills.

To find the meaning of something puzzling or difficult

'Transcribe' is the one about writing out in full.

The rhyme about Mistress Mary and her garden

She read it with great seriousness.

As proof that Earthlings could grow crops of rare metals and explosives

He said they had combined agriculture and mining.

He said it was no time for levity, given the seriousness of the discovery

'Levity' means treating serious matters without respect.

They were told to hold, because new information had come in

Noodle had reported that they were ready to take over.

That Earthlings had taught animals musical culture and space techniques

He feared an interplanetary attack of millions of cows.

That there would be no invasion that day

The invasion is postponed, not yet abandoned.

He turned the large picture towards Think-Tank and the audience

He had noticed who the picture resembled.

That the Earthlings planned to capture Mars Central Control and him

He calls it an invasion of Mars.

Alpha Centauri, a hundred million miles away

He ordered the entire planet of Mars to be evacuated.

He had been replaced by the wise and wonderful Noodle

The apprentice who was never listened to now rules the planet.

The difference between sandwiches and books, and how to read

And they set up a model library in Marsopolis.

1 and 2 only

Nobody on Earth ever knew the Martians had been there.

No Earthling ever knew they were there; Think-Tank frightened himself away

He even orders all traces of the visit to be removed.

The cow and the moon — animals taught space techniques

The garden gave him the metals; Humpty Dumpty gave him the plot.

A tyrant reads three nursery rhymes as threats and evacuates his own planet

And a historian tells us what followed five centuries later.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include at least seven of: Oop reading the rhyme and turning the picture; Think-Tank's scream and the balloon brain; his reading of the great fall as a plan to capture Mars Central Control; the space capsule; the order to remove all traces and the books being replac…

It shows the audience what happened on Mars and Earth in 2040

Everything after Scene 1 is that projection.

We know the ending in advance, so the interest lies in how it happened

The play is a story inside a story.

He cannot remember the name of the planet he means to invade

And he treats his own forgetfulness as proof that Earth is insignificant.

Because it paused before answering, and he hates a slow mirror

He then admires himself in it.

Snow White, in which a queen questions her mirror

The fairy-tale echo makes his vanity funnier.

Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A

Both are true. Where he sits and what he looks like are not what makes him misread what the crew find.

That respect for him is a rule rather than something he has earned

It is printed on a sign, like an office notice.

It reduces the conquest of a planet to an item on a morning's timetable

And, of course, the invasion never happens at all.

The lowest-ranking character turns out to be the only reliable one

By the end of the play he has replaced Think-Tank.

It makes Think-Tank look like a stage magician rather than a scientist

The costume is part of the joke about his authority.

So that the audience can enjoy watching how the mistake unfolds

Comedy of this kind depends on the audience knowing more than the characters.

He describes conquest as a favour he is doing to Earth

The planet, meanwhile, is a primitive ball of mud to him.

Think-Tank treats a big head as proof of brains, and is fooled by a nursery rhyme

And a picture of Humpty Dumpty finally terrifies him.

He is ridiculous before he is dangerous — vain, forgetful and easily flattered

He does have an invasion fleet, ready to go down and take over.

It makes the theatre itself part of her museum, with us as the visitors

She bows to us at the start, and again at the end.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the genuine power he holds; the corrected salutation; the mirror episode with the pause and the smack; the judgement of species by head size and the balloon brain; the forgotten name of Earth and the inference drawn from it; the argument that a ruler who is…

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the terms of the Era of the Book speech with the list and the four verbs; the claim that a book saved the Earth; the three grand kinds of book ruled out; the Martians' failure to identify books at all; the humbleness of the book that finally works; the misr…

He has been to seven galaxies and never seen anything like a book

Nothing in Martian experience matches a printed page.

To confirm his own opinion about what it is

The evidence is collected after the conclusion has been reached.

As an insignificant bit of data that had floated into his mind

Think-Tank calls it trifling and allows him to continue.

He says haughtily that it was his next point, and renames them communication sandwiches

And then asks who is never wrong.

The wrong frequency, sharper Earthling ears, and silent sandwiches

None of them says that the order itself was absurd.

Each protects Think-Tank from the possibility of being wrong

He asks pointedly whether anyone is suggesting a mistake.

As a cloudy piece of information twirling around in his head

Think-Tank offers to clarify it for him.

A is true, but R is false

Noodle only hints, and very carefully, because no one may tell him he is wrong. The assertion holds, the reason does not.

Offering the fact as something trifling and letting Think-Tank draw the conclusion

It is the only way to correct a ruler who is never wrong.

It shows that people explain the unfamiliar by whatever they already know

Barns, hats and shops — all of them Martian ideas.

The elaborate politeness with which each officer passes it to the next

Breakfast and good manners are the excuses used.

That certainty can be complete and still be entirely wrong

Three theories, delivered with equal authority.

To make the crew confirm his authority immediately after a correction

The salute comes just after he has changed his mind.

It makes the setting an ordinary small-town building rather than a fortress

Nothing less military could be imagined.

It establishes that Think-Tank will fit any evidence into his own ideas

Which is exactly what he does with three nursery rhymes.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the difficulty of correcting a ruler who is never wrong; the self-belittling introductions (insignificant bit of data, cloudy piece of information); the supplying of facts without conclusions; Think-Tank claiming each conclusion as his next point or his own…

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the reasonableness of the Martians' ignorance; the crew's guesses drawn from their own categories; Think-Tank's conclusion preceding his evidence; the order to eat as confirmation rather than investigation; the crew agreeing against the evidence of their se…

The word 'code' — he admitted they might not be as primitive as thought

The only concession he makes to Earth in the whole play.

Noodle's, raised as a question about the chemical department

Think-Tank promptly announced it as his own.

That even the dogs of Earth had a sense of humour

He treats every element of the rhyme as a fact.

To remove all traces of their visit, so the Earthlings would not know that he knew

They rush about putting books back on the shelves.

Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A

The text is the same; the reader is the variable.

He has boasted about his huge egg-shaped brain since his first scene

His vanity chose the weapon that would rout him.

The words of the rhymes, but no sense of what a nursery rhyme is

They can transcribe every word and still miss the joke.

He finds resources, weapons and finally a plot against himself

A nervous conqueror finds exactly what he is looking for.

It shows how completely the rescue went unnoticed on Earth

The Earthlings must not know that Think-Tank knows.

The one character who supplied facts rather than opinions now rules

The Historian calls him the wise and wonderful Noodle.

It keeps the comedy going after the moral has been made

They have a model library, and one book they will not touch.

Their power lies in what a reader brings to them, not in the books themselves

The rescuing book was dusty, old and meant for children.

It closes the frame, lets us hear the aftermath, and keeps the tone light

She bows and exits, and the curtain falls.

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the three rhymes named and who read each; the agriculture-and-mining reading with silver, cockle shells and explosives; the fleet being told to hold; the reading of the animals as trained in musical culture and space techniques, the dogs' humour and the att…

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Content 3 · Expression 2 · Accuracy 1. Content should include: the Historian ruling out the grand kinds of book; the humbleness of Mother Goose and the ordinary library; the accuracy of the transcriptions; the three misreadings traced to Think-Tank's own fears and vanity; the earlier scenes that prepared them; the abse…