Season 257

Originating at London's Harrow School in the 19th century, competitors in this high-speed sport battle for dominance over the central "t-line" within a fully enclosed playing space.
Players utilize specialized shots like the "boast" and aim for the unplayable bounce of the "nick," all while avoiding the lower out-of-bounds boundary known as the "tin."
Because competitors share the exact same floor area, referees must frequently decide whether physical interference warrants a "let" or a "stroke."
By what name is this sport known?

Starring Judy Garland and featuring the debut of the song "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," this classic musical follows a Midwestern family devastated by an impending relocation to New York.
The move threatens to uproot the daughters' romances and forces the family to miss a colossal international exhibition being constructed in their home city.
Culminating with the grand spring opening of this massive event, exactly forty years prior to the film's theatrical premiere, in what year is the climax of this film set?

In 1349, the title held by the rulers of a southeastern French province became exclusively reserved for the heir apparent to the throne.
Named after the animal featured on the region's coat of arms, by what title was the French crown prince traditionally known?

Traditionally consisting of three hinged panels, this artistic format became especially prominent in medieval and Renaissance Christian altarpieces, allowing the outer wings to be opened or closed for different occasions.
Famously employed by Hieronymus Bosch for The Garden of Earthly Delights, by what name is this three-part work of art known?

Developed at the MIT Media Lab and first released in 2007, this visual programming language teaches coding by allowing users to snap together colorful blocks instead of writing text-based code.
Featuring an orange feline mascot and widely used in schools around the world, by what name is this educational platform known?

Premiering as a visual film on HBO in April 2016, this concept album utilizes the poetry of Warsan Shire to structure a narrative about generational trauma, Black feminism, and high-profile marital infidelity.
Featuring a famous sequence with a baseball bat named "Hot Sauce" and concluding with the lead single "Formation," by what title is this Beyoncé album known?

Intertwining the lives of four young Athenian lovers with magical interference in an enchanted forest, this Shakespearean comedy features a group of amateur actors who disastrously attempt to stage the tragedy of Pyramus and Thisbe.
Culminating in a triple wedding hosted by Duke Theseus, by what title is this play known?

Explaining how deterministic systems can nevertheless exhibit seemingly random behavior due to extreme sensitivity to initial conditions, this branch of mathematics and physics encompasses concepts such as the butterfly effect and the universal Feigenbaum constant governing period-doubling bifurcations.
By what collective name is this field known?

Produced as the most expensive British television series of its time, this mid-1970s sci-fi classic starred Martin Landau and Barbara Bain.
The narrative begins when a catastrophic nuclear waste explosion propels the Moon out of Earth's orbit, leaving the inhabitants of a lunar research station to wander through deep space.
By what title is this television series known?

The following events all took place in which year?
The volcanic eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland grounds air travel across northern and western Europe for days.
Apple's CEO unveils the first-generation iPad tablet at an event in San Francisco.
The Burj Khalifa officially opens in Dubai, claiming the title of the world's tallest building.
Social networking giant Facebook is chronicled in the critically acclaimed biographical drama The Social Network.
Scientist J. Craig Venter and his team announce the creation of the first synthetic living cell controlled by artificial DNA.

Published in 1963, this beloved children's picture book by Maurice Sendak follows a mischievous boy named Max, who sails to an island inhabited by strange creatures and is crowned their king before leading the famous "Wild Rumpus."
By what title is this book known?

Completed in 1762 to a design begun by Nicola Salvi, this monumental Baroque fountain depicting Oceanus standing atop a shell-shaped chariot drawn by two sea horses famously served as the backdrop for Anita Ekberg's midnight wade in Federico Fellini's 1960 film La Dolce Vita.
Today, visitors traditionally toss a coin over their shoulder into its waters to ensure a future return to the Eternal City.
By what name is this landmark known?

Best known as the company behind Marlboro outside the United States, this tobacco giant has increasingly repositioned itself around smoke-free nicotine products, particularly the heated tobacco system IQOS.
Originally founded in London in the 19th century before evolving into one of the world's largest tobacco manufacturers, by what name is this company known?

Developed by a blind French student while still a teenager and inspired by Charles Barbier's military "night writing" system, this tactile writing method represents letters, numbers, and punctuation using patterns of six raised dots.
By what name is this reading and writing system known?