What are the origins of the term Banbury Tales?I've run across the term in some novels I read, it has something to do with a girl or woman telling...

There are several references to Banbury in the connection to stories.  Banbury, England was a site for the publication of many fairy tales, like “Cinderella.”  “Banbury Cross and Other Nursery Rhymes" is probably the reference you are encountering in various novels.  The Dent Banbury Cross series of stories was very popular and has had many years of popularity.

“Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross,
To see a Fyne lady ride on a white horse.
With rings on her fingers and bells on her toes,
She shall have music wherever she goes.”

How do the guests avoid the seventh room in "The Masque of the Red Death"?

My son and I are covering this story right now.  He has an assignment to draw the castellated abbey of Prince Prospero.  Based on our understanding of the story, the rooms flow from east to west, with the black room being last.  The revelers simply "don't go there", as they are not required to go to it/through it to reach any of the other rooms.  They also are probably trying to avoid it, due to its' death the.

In "A Doll's House", Torvald makes a comment concerning Nora's management of money. Why is this comment ironic?

Yes - he calls her a "spendthrift", and metes out the household money to her from his own pocket, rather stingily.

The irony comes simply because Nora is, in fact, an extremely skilful manager of money. What Torvald is unaware of is that she, long before the play began, organised a loan of enough money to take her husband abroad, in order to save his life. Torvald never knew of this loan, and Nora has been working in secret to pay it off for years, forging her father's signature in order to secure it.

Though Torvald treats her like a "doll", Ibsen makes it quite clear that she is an adult perfectly capable of dealing with responsibility.

Why was the life expectancy of the people in Anthem by Ayn Rand only 45?

The future society portrayed by Ayn Rand in Anthem is actually a society based on humankind's past. Essentially, the setting she creates is one of humankind before all the technological and ideological advances that had been made when Rand wrote the text in the twentieth century - essentially the Dark Ages placed in the future.

So - just like in the Dark Ages - humans do not live as long in Anthem's society as they do now because they do not have the advances in medicine, safety, diet, etc. that we have now.

In addition, there is something to be said about the mental health of the people living in a Dark Age. In chapter two, Equality 7-2521 describes his brethren: "There are Fraternity 2-5503, a quiet boy with wise, kind eyes, who cry suddenly, without reason, in the midst of day or night, and their body shakes with sobs they cannot explain. There are Solidarity 9-6347, who are a bright youth, without fear in the day; but they scream in their sleep...'Help us!' 'Help us!'" Any modern psychologist would say these men suffer from severe untreated depression, which would greatly shorten a person's life if left untreated.

Finally, at the age of forty, these people are forced to go to the Home of the Useless. "They sit in the sun in summer and they sit by the fire in winter." What person wouldn't take that life over the life of a workhorse? And once there, what person wouldn't slowly pass into death with nothing to do but remember a life of work and sadness?

In "The Crucible" how does Mary Warren gain her "authority" as she sees it?Question is from Act II.

Given what she states to John and Elizabeth Proctor, she feels that she has authority given to her by the courts, and probably from God.  She tells them "I am an official of the court they say", referring most likely to the judges in charge of running things.  So, based on their words, she has taken her "authority" to heart, along with what she feels is God's mission.  Of this she states, "I am amazed you do not see what weighty work we do...it is God's work we do...the Devil's loose in Salem, Mr. Proctor; we must discover where he's hiding!"  She is most likely parroting phrases from the judges themselves, and gains new-found courage in light of her "importance" in court.  She stands up to John, telling him that she'll "not stand whipping any more" and that she'll "not be ordered to bed no more."  The only other glimpse that we get of Mary Warren before this is in the first Act where she is whining and shaking in her boots about the potential of being called a witch because of their dancing.  Her court-appointed "authority" and self-important mission for God has given her a bit more snuff than she usually displays.

How does Bradbury build suspense in "Fahrenheit 451"?

One way Bradbury builds suspense is by mentioning the ventilator grille repeatedly.  He says Montag thought about it and what lay hidden behind it without telling us what that hidden something is.  He says that Montag looked at the grille.  By mentioning something seemingly insignificant - the grille - in such a way, the readers knows this grille, or what lay hidden behind it, will take on importance at some point in the story.  That's suspense because we don't know what is hidden there and when we do realize it's books, we don't know how important that revelation will be.  Also, Bradbury mentions the Mechanical Hound in much the same way.  We get a malevolent description of it and then ominous sounding statements about it and about something outside Montag's front door making a "scratching" sound.  More mystery to the reader which builds suspense.  The constant and increasing in frequency mention of the war planes and of war news also builds suspense in the story for the reader.  The reader might dismiss the war planes flying overhead or the news on the radio at first, but the increase in frequency of mention in the story makes the reader aware that this, like the grille, will be important and that war is imminent.

In "The Crucible, can you give me some quotes in the scene where Mary Warren accuses John Proctor?

Mary Warren initially went to the court to confess that she and the girls had been pretending.  However, just as she had predicted at the end of Act  Two ("They'll turn on me!  I cannot!"), Abby and the girls did in fact turn on her.  They cried out, insisting that Mary's familiar spirt came into the courtroom in the form of a yellow bird that was going to claw Abby's face.  Judge Danforth immediately picks up on the cue, and asks Mary if she is a witch, and asks John if he is somehow forcing Mary to turn on the girls.

When Danforth suggests Mary will hang for being a witch, Mary finally caves, and turns on John, calling him a "Devil's man" (look at the very, very end of Act Three for the quotes you need) who had come to her with his black book to sign, and forced her to come to the courts to overthrow them.  This is truly sad, as she was the last thread of hope that Proctor had for saving his wife and friends.