Static GK
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🔒 Log in to trackClassics & freedom-era works
| Book | Author |
|---|---|
| Arthashastra | Kautilya (Chanakya) |
| Gitanjali (Nobel 1913) | Rabindranath Tagore |
| Anandamath (contains Vande Mataram) | Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay |
| Godan, Gaban, Nirmala | Munshi Premchand |
| Hind Swaraj (1909), My Experiments with Truth | M.K. Gandhi |
| The Discovery of India, Glimpses of World History | Jawaharlal Nehru |
| Poverty and Un-British Rule in India | Dadabhai Naoroji |
| India Wins Freedom | Maulana Abul Kalam Azad |
| Annihilation of Caste | B.R. Ambedkar |
| Unto This Last (Gandhi's Sarvodaya) | John Ruskin |
Modern Indian fiction
| Book | Author | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Midnight's Children | Salman Rushdie | Booker 1981 |
| The God of Small Things | Arundhati Roy | Booker 1997 |
| The Inheritance of Loss | Kiran Desai | Booker 2006 |
| The White Tiger | Aravind Adiga | Booker 2008 |
| Train to Pakistan | Khushwant Singh | Partition novel |
| The Guide, Malgudi Days | R.K. Narayan | Fictional town Malgudi |
| A Suitable Boy | Vikram Seth | |
| Tomb of Sand (Ret Samadhi) | Geetanjali Shree (tr. Daisy Rockwell) | International Booker 2022 |
Sports & public-life autobiographies
| Book | Author |
|---|---|
| Playing It My Way | Sachin Tendulkar |
| Sunny Days | Sunil Gavaskar |
| Straight from the Heart | Kapil Dev |
| The Race of My Life | Milkha Singh |
| Unbreakable | M.C. Mary Kom |
| Ace Against Odds | Sania Mirza |
| The Test of My Life | Yuvraj Singh |
| Ignited Minds, India 2020 | A.P.J. Abdul Kalam |
Ancient and classical Indian texts
| Book | Author | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Arthashastra | Kautilya (Chanakya) | Statecraft and economy of the Mauryan age |
| Rajatarangini | Kalhana | Historical chronicle of Kashmir |
| Abhijnana Shakuntalam | Kalidasa | The most famous Sanskrit drama |
| Mudrarakshasa | Vishakhadatta | Story of Chanakya and Chandragupta |
| Indica | Megasthenes | Greek envoy's account of Mauryan India |
| Harshacharita | Banabhatta | Biography of Harshavardhana |
| Panchatantra | Vishnu Sharma | Fable collection |
| Ramcharitmanas | Tulsidas | Awadhi retelling of the Ramayana |
Medieval chronicles and biographies
Baburnama - autobiography of Babur (in Turkish, the first of its kind in Indian history); Akbarnama and Ain-i-Akbari - Abul Fazl; Tuzuk-i-Jahangiri - Jahangir's own memoir; Padshahnama - Abdul Hamid Lahori (Shah Jahan's reign).
The freedom era and modern India
| Book | Author |
|---|---|
| Anandamath (source of Vande Mataram) | Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay |
| Gitanjali (Nobel 1913) | Rabindranath Tagore |
| Hind Swaraj; My Experiments with Truth (autobiography) | M.K. Gandhi |
| Discovery of India; Glimpses of World History | Jawaharlal Nehru |
| Poverty and Un-British Rule in India | Dadabhai Naoroji |
| Train to Pakistan | Khushwant Singh |
| Malgudi Days; Swami and Friends | R.K. Narayan |
| A Suitable Boy | Vikram Seth |
Autobiographies and memoirs
Wings of Fire - A.P.J. Abdul Kalam; Long Walk to Freedom - Nelson Mandela; The Story of My Life - Helen Keller; Autobiography of an Unknown Indian - Nirad C. Chaudhuri; Playing It My Way - Sachin Tendulkar; Straight from the Heart - Kapil Dev; A Shot at History - Abhinav Bindra.
Indian winners of the Booker Prize
Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie (1981; also the 'Booker of Bookers'); The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy (1997); The Inheritance of Loss - Kiran Desai (2006); The White Tiger - Aravind Adiga (2008). Kiran Desai is the daughter of Anita Desai, who was shortlisted several times but never won.
World classics in one glance
| Book | Author | Book | Author |
|---|---|---|---|
| War and Peace | Tolstoy | Crime and Punishment | Dostoevsky |
| Pride and Prejudice | Jane Austen | Hamlet, Macbeth | Shakespeare |
| Iliad, Odyssey | Homer | Don Quixote | Cervantes |
| One Hundred Years of Solitude | Marquez | The Old Man and the Sea | Hemingway |
| Animal Farm, 1984 | Orwell | The Godfather | Puzo |
| The Origin of Species | Darwin | Das Kapital | Karl Marx |
| The Wealth of Nations | Adam Smith | The Republic | Plato |
| Paradise Lost | Milton | The Canterbury Tales | Chaucer |
Question types you will see
Each type: how to recognise it, the method step by step, and one question to try.
Ancient/medieval text ↔ author
'Who wrote Arthashastra/Rajatarangini/Akbarnama', 'Indica is an account of', Sanskrit drama questions.
Ancient set: Kautilya-Arthashastra, Kalhana-Rajatarangini, Kalidasa-Abhijnana Shakuntalam, Vishakhadatta-Mudrarakshasa, Megasthenes-Indica, Banabhatta-Harshacharita, Vishnu Sharma-Panchatantra.
Mughal set: Babur-Baburnama (own memoir), Abul Fazl-Akbarnama + Ain-i-Akbari, Jahangir-Tuzuk-i-Jahangiri.
Distractors usually swap authors within the same period - eliminate by court and century.
Who wrote Rajatarangini, the historical chronicle of Kashmir?
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Kalhana (12th century). Arthashastra - Kautilya; Harshacharita - Banabhatta.
Freedom-era work ↔ author
'Discovery of India was written by', 'Hind Swaraj', 'Anandamath', 'Gitanjali', works of Gandhi-Nehru-Tagore-Bankim.
Gandhi - Hind Swaraj and his autobiography My Experiments with Truth; Nehru - Discovery of India and Glimpses of World History.
Bankim Chandra - Anandamath (source of Vande Mataram); Tagore - Gitanjali (Nobel 1913).
Dadabhai Naoroji - Poverty and Un-British Rule in India (drain theory).
Anandamath, the novel that gave the nation Vande Mataram, was written by —
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Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay. Discovery of India - Nehru; Hind Swaraj - Gandhi.
Autobiography ↔ author
'Wings of Fire is the autobiography of', 'Long Walk to Freedom', 'My Experiments with Truth', memoir matching.
Wings of Fire - A.P.J. Abdul Kalam; My Experiments with Truth - M.K. Gandhi; Long Walk to Freedom - Nelson Mandela.
Playing It My Way - Sachin Tendulkar; A Shot at History - Abhinav Bindra; The Story of My Life - Helen Keller.
Baburnama is the earliest autobiography linked to India - Babur's own, in Turkish.
Long Walk to Freedom is the autobiography of —
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Nelson Mandela. Wings of Fire - Kalam; My Experiments with Truth - Gandhi.
Booker Prize winners ↔ book
'Who wrote The White Tiger', 'Midnight's Children', 'The Inheritance of Loss', Booker-linking questions.
Indian Booker winners: Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie (1981), The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy (1997), The Inheritance of Loss - Kiran Desai (2006), The White Tiger - Aravind Adiga (2008).
Midnight's Children also won the 'Booker of Bookers'.
Anita Desai was repeatedly shortlisted but never won - a favourite distractor next to her daughter Kiran.
Who is the author of The White Tiger (Booker Prize 2008)?
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Aravind Adiga. The other Indian Booker books: Midnight's Children-Rushdie, God of Small Things-Roy, Inheritance of Loss-Kiran Desai.
World classic ↔ author
'War and Peace', 'One Hundred Years of Solitude', 'Don Quixote', 'The Republic', foreign classics and thinkers.
Russia: Tolstoy-War and Peace, Dostoevsky-Crime and Punishment.
Greece/Rome: Homer-Iliad + Odyssey, Plato-The Republic.
West: Shakespeare-Hamlet/Macbeth, Austen-Pride and Prejudice, Cervantes-Don Quixote, Orwell-Animal Farm + 1984, Marquez-One Hundred Years of Solitude, Darwin-Origin of Species, Marx-Das Kapital, Adam Smith-Wealth of Nations.
One Hundred Years of Solitude, a landmark of magical realism, was written by —
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Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Colombia). Don Quixote - Cervantes; War and Peace - Tolstoy.
Shortcuts that save time
Four India-connected Booker winners in order: Midnight's Children → God of Small Things → Inheritance of Loss → White Tiger. Geetanjali Shree (2022) won the International Booker (for translated fiction).
Who wrote 'The White Tiger', the 2008 Booker winner?
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Aravind Adiga.
Sunny Days = Sunil Gavaskar · Race of My Life = Milkha (the 'Flying Sikh' raced) · Unbreakable = Mary Kom (boxer) · Ace = Sania (tennis ace) · Test of My Life = Yuvraj (cancer battle).
Mistakes to avoid
Where most students lose marks on this subtopic.
Vande Mataram is from Anandamath (Bankim), not from Tagore's works — Tagore wrote Jana Gana Mana.
Unto This Last was written by John Ruskin; Gandhi only paraphrased it into Gujarati as Sarvodaya.
The Discovery of India was written by Nehru in Ahmednagar Fort jail (1942–46).
Quick revision
Read this the night before the exam.
Kautilya-Arthashastra, Kalhana-Rajatarangini, Kalidasa-Shakuntalam, Megasthenes-Indica, Banabhatta-Harshacharita, Vishnu Sharma-Panchatantra.
Baburnama = Babur's own story; Akbarnama = Abul Fazl; Tuzuk-i-Jahangiri = Jahangir.
Gandhi-Hind Swaraj + My Experiments with Truth; Nehru-Discovery of India; Tagore-Gitanjali (Nobel 1913).
Bookers: Rushdie 1981, Roy 1997, Kiran Desai 2006, Adiga 2008.
Wings of Fire-Kalam, Long Walk to Freedom-Mandela, Playing It My Way-Tendulkar.
Practice: 20 questions
Sets of 10, mixed across the question types above. Every answer has a step-by-step explanation.
Topic test · 10 questions
Suggested time 3 min · wrong answers go to your mistake notebook automatically.