SINGAPORE - What novel by Jane Austen is also a girl's name starting with the letter E?
What famous playwright was born in Stratford-upon-Avon?
These were among the practice questions for the Kids' Lit Quiz 2018, which consists of questions from a wide range of genres, from fantasy to classic novels to comics.
In the national finals of the quiz on Friday (April 20) between 10 teams, the group of four from Raffles Girls' School (Secondary) emerged tops, and will be representing the nation in New Zealand this July.
They will meet teams from countries like Canada and Australia.
Singapore's students aged from 10 to 13 have been placing within the top seven at the world finals ever since it started taking part in the competition in 2014.
A team from St Joseph's Institution (SJI) Junior placed fifth in the world last year.
Organised by National Library Board (NLB) and supported by POSB, the Kids' Lit Quiz saw a record 126 teams from 71 schools who signed up this year to test their students' knowledge of literature. Last year, there were 82 teams.
The quiz is part of NLB's efforts to encourage Singaporeans to read more, read widely and read together. It seeks to instill a love for reading in the younger generation while inspiring the wider public to read by taking part in innovative reading programmes.
This quiz was founded by quizmaster Wayne Mills in 1991. He is a former senior lecturer at the University of Auckland in the Faculty of Education, and he runs all the quizzes in each participating country and crafts original questions for each quiz.
"Not all children are good at sports, not all children are good at math. This is the one day of the year that they get to shine," said Mr Mills, who hosted the national finals on Friday at Our Tampines Hub.
Faith Tan, 13, leader of the winning team, said: "Reading has been my hobby since I was young, but after secondary school the workload got heavier, so I had no time for reading. But this competition helped me find time for my hobby... it gave me an opportunity to do what I love."
When asked about her goals for the world finals, she said: "Hopefully we'll be ranked in the top three, but whatever happens we will give our best."
Singapore will be hosting the world finals for the first time next year.
