Proust questionnaire: 35 questions to your characters by Marcel Proust
How do you get to know someone But do you really get to know them, beyond the surface, things like where they grew up, what they do for work, and what hobbies they enjoy?
Finding ways to get to know someone is especially important for writers. Whether you're interviewing someone for an article or book, or interviewing your fictional characters as a characterization exercise, knowing about people inevitably makes you a better writer.
A tried and tested method of getting to know someone is the Proust questionnaire. Recorded twice in particular by the French writer Marcel Proust, it provides the perfect setting to better understand a person's deep motivation.
In this article, we're going to dig into the origins of the Proust questionnaire, look at notable examples of its use by celebrities, and then examine how you can use it to better understand your characters.
Finally, we'll use a creative writing exercise to apply these thirty-five questions to our writing.
The origin of the Proust questionnaire
In the late nineteenth century, question lists were a popular distraction for discovering new things about old friends. They were similar to the lists of questions posted on social media.
Marcel Proust, the soon-to-be writer and essayist, was only fourteen years old when he first filled in the questions in a confession album (a kind of bound diary of prompts) entitled "An album to record thoughts, feelings, etc." “He must have enjoyed it because six years later, at the age of twenty, he filled it out again.
Proust, who grew up in the French elite, revealed his answers after his death in the matters of his friend Antoinette Faure, the daughter of French President Félix Faure. But that was not the end, because in 2003 the album with Proust's answers was auctioned for 102,000 euros.
Not bad for a board game!
Example: Vanity Fair's Proity Questionnaire
The Proust questionnaire was widely used as an interview tool, particularly by Vanity Fair magazine, which interviewed over a hundred celebrities using the questions, including writers Joan Didion and Norman Mailer, singers David Bowie and Ray Charles, actors Sidney Poitier and Carrie Fischer and many more.
These interviews were even converted into a book published in 2009, Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire: 101 Lights Reflect on Love, Death, Happiness, and the Purpose of Life, complete with illustrations by Robert Risko.
How creative authors can use the Proust questionnaire
When you take a great story down to its essence, you need two things in the beginning: a great character and a difficult situation (also known as a thrilling incident).
But how do you come up with interesting characters?
And how can you get to know these characters well enough to write a great story about them?
When it comes to characters, the classic advice is "write what you know". The better you know them, the more real your story will feel.
The Proust questionnaire can help here. More than just a board game, it will help you transform your characters from strangers to friends, from nobodies to heroes and heroines.
While these questions were originally intended for personal use, I found them helpful questions to ask my characters and better understand them.
To use it, answer the questions not for yourself, but for your characters. In other words, use the Proust questionnaire to interview your characters!
The Proust questionnaire
Here are the thirty-five questions Proust originally answered in 1890:
- What is your idea of perfect happiness?
- What is your biggest fear?
- What is the trait that you regret most about yourself?
- What is the trait you regret most in others?
- Which living person do you admire most?
- What is your greatest extravaganza?
- What is your current state of mind?
- What do you think is the most overrated virtue?
- On what occasion do you lie
- What do you dislike most about the way you look?
- Which living person do you despise most?
- What is the quality you like most in a man?
- What is the quality you like most in a woman?
- Which words or phrases do you use most often?
- What or who is the greatest love of your life?
- When and where were you happiest?
- What is your favorite talent?
- If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
- What is the greatest achievement for you?
- If you died and came back as a person or as a thing, what would it be?
- Where would you most like to live?
- What is your most valuable possession?
- What is the lowest depth of misery for you?
- What is your favorite job
- What is your most distinctive quality?
- What do you value most about your friends?
- Who are your favorite authors?
- Who is your fictional hero?
- Which historical figure do you identify with the most?
- Who are your heroes in real life?
- What are your favorite names
- What do you like the least?
- What is your biggest regret?
- How would you like to die
- What's your motto
Other questionnaires for characterization
The Proust questionnaire is by no means the only series of questions that you can use. Here are other popular sources for characterization questionnaires:
- James Lipton's questionnaire
- Bernard Pivot Questionnaire
If you love some questions from Proust but also want to find new questions to add to your list, try mixing and matching these other two options.
Knowing characters (well) will make your story better
Getting to know many different people on a personal level will inevitably make you a better writer. For the most part, our best creative ideas are inspired by the experiences and people we met along the way.
However, in order to really get to know someone – while avoiding awkward small talk – it is helpful to have a number of practical questions already in your list of questions.
The same goes for developing characters before writing.
Proust asked thirty-five questions that are great conversation starters. Different people will answer his questions in unique ways, as will the characters you create for your books.
Use a handful or all of their questions to interview the character for your stories (or people in your life) before writing them. That way, you make sure that you are creating a diverse, rich cast with a wide variety of personalities – resulting in a more interesting plot and story, too!
How about you? What is your favorite question? What do you ask your characters to get to know them better? Let us know in the comments.
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