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1. Make a start by opening your mouth in the Mongolian desert, and with your fourth step you might encounter an operatic baritone. ÌýCan you explain? <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

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2. Let's hope no one impedes your efforts to connect:

Christopher Morley's wartime best-seller, spiced with Ginger;

A Kitchen adorned with Honeysuckle, again with a wartime setting;

And a tasteful bookseller who predated both.

3. Music question: Why is this music the equal of Alain-Fournier, a yacht once owned by Roman Abramovich, and the entire 17th century?

4. Music question: Why might Evelyn Waugh and Margery Allingham be interested in these two?

5. Which two battles, one in the Crimea and an earlier one in Northern France, might make you think of the eighth circle of hell, and of forbidden fruit?

6. (From Stephen Reynolds) A quilt filling, an Orwellian hero heading to the surface, and a Diarist’s creator: how are they linked to the genus ‘Gryllus’?

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7. (From Elliott Manley) How was Kafka more singular than Ovid, Nancy Friday more possessive than Frances Hodgson Burnett, and Flann O’Brien more forceful than Graham Greene and Carol Reed combined?

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8. William Somerset’s search for a serial killer; Guido Anselmi’s search for inspiration; and George Webber’s search for a beautiful woman: why are they equidistant?

Why might you be happy to receive salt in Tibet, cowrie shells in south Asia, and cattle in ancient Rome? <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

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The answer is, because they all are, or have been, used as forms of currency.

Marco Polo reported seeing cakes of salt being exchanged as currency in Tibet, pressed with the image of the Grand Khan. Salt is still used as money amongÌýthe nomads of Ethiopia's Danakil plains.

The porcelain-like cowrie shell, of the marine snail family Cypraeidae, has striking patterns of translucent colours like precious gemstones,Ìýand is sometimes used as money in parts of southern Asia.

Cattle have frequently been exchanged as currency, as well as for the payment of fines, dowries and the like, in ancient Rome and in many other cultures.

'Glittering' Frederic; the director of Blow-Up; and Jack Dawson - which amphibian is missing?

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Don't write or e-mail - there are no prizes - but we will reveal the answer inÌýnext week's programme.