Proust's Thirty-Five Questions to Ask Your Characters

I’ve been reading the Write Practice for several months and always find the posts informational and provocative. I was particularly taken with today’s post about delving into the lives of your novel’s characters. I’m in the midst of the first revision of my novel and I’m looking for ways to round them out. Marcel Proust’s Thirty-five Questions to Ask Your Characters will definitely help. Here’s his list, written in the late nineteenth century. By the way, his answers sold in auction for €102,000 in 2003.

1.   What is your idea of perfect happiness?

2.   What is your greatest fear?

3.   What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?

4.   What is the trait you most deplore in others?

5.   Which living person do you most admire?

6.   What is your greatest extravagance?

7.   What is your current state of mind?

8.   What do you consider the most overrated virtue?

9.   On what occasion do you lie?

10.    What do you most dislike about your appearance?

11.    Which living person do you most despise?

12.    What is the quality you most like in a man?

13.    What is the quality you most like in a woman?

14.    Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

15.    What or who is the greatest love of your life?

16.    When and where were you happiest?

17.    Which talent would you most like to have?

18.    If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

19.    What do you consider your greatest achievement?

20.    If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be?

21.    Where would you most like to live?

22.    What is your most treasured possession?

23.    What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

24.    What is your favorite occupation?

25.    What is your most marked characteristic?

26.    What do you most value in your friends?

27.    Who are your favorite writers?

28.    Who is your hero of fiction?

29.    Which historical figure do you most identify with?

30.    Who are your heroes in real life?

31.    What are your favorite names?

32.    What is it that you most dislike?

33.    What is your greatest regret?

34.    How would you like to die?

35.    What is your motto?

And as Joe Bunting (@joebunting)of the Write Practice asked:

Which questions do you ask your characters to get to know them better?

  

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Who is the Write Practice?

Joe Bunting is the founder of the Write Practice. Joe is a ghostwriter, editor, and an aspiring fiction author and writes and edits books that change lives. He loves the sound of a good sentence and would like to think of himself as a literary snob but can be kept up far too late by a page turner meant for thirteen year old girls. He would like for you not to know that though. He and his wife, Talia, enjoy playing backgammon and Angry Birds on her iPhone. You can view his website and follow on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.

Liz is on the left

Liz Bureman has a more-than-healthy interest in proper grammatical structure, accurate spelling, and the underappreciated semicolon. When she’s not diagramming sentences and reading blogs about how terribly written the Twilight series is, she edits for the Write Practice, causes trouble in Denver, and plays guitar very slowly and poorly. She occasionally blogs at http://bureface.wordpress.com, but only when she feels like it.

        

The talking rock

My five days of writing at Esalen at Big Sur, California were wonderful. I wrote five poems and heard some valuable new writing information, which I plan to share with you in the next couple of weeks.

Esalen is getting more and more into the twenty-first century. They've added Internet service in the dining room - where everyone congregates whether it's meal time or not - and we were lucky to have it in our meeting room as well.

However, there is no cell phone access anywhere on the property.

I usually take a walk first thing - much like I do at home - and last year I saw a young man - probably an Esalen staff person - standing on top of a large rock by the side of the highway talking on his cell phone. So I decided to investigate and sure enough I got cell phone reception - not the best, only three little bars, but definitely enough to make a call. Also, the young man told me in which direction to point my phone for best results.

This year I walked the same route - north about twenty-five minutes - on Highway One, and I stopped at the rock every morning on my way back to call my husband. It worked like a charm. The best part of this discovery is I don't have to wait to use a pay phone on the Esalen property anymore. 

Thought you'd like to see what my Talking Rock looks like. By the way, it has a nice ocean view.

My Talking Rock

In case you're wondering, I didn't stand on the rock, I stood on the ocean side of it.

Taking an Esalen break

I'll be taking a few days' break from here while I attend my yearly poetry workshop at Esalen Institute in Big Sur California. I leave for the six-hour drive from our home in southern California to go to central California in about one hour.

I love this workshop. It's a time for reflection, relaxation and some heavy-duty poetry writing. We have a craft talk every morning and then go off to write until we get together again to share our work mid afternoons. I'll take good notes on the craft talks and share them with you when I get back.

In the meantime, here are a couple of my favorite photos from the Esalen grounds. And reflections from one of my favorite times at Esalen when my husband and I went there to celebrate my sixtieth birthday.

Turning 60

As 60th birthdays go it wasn't too bad. But how would I know any difference? This was the first and last time I'll ever turn 60. Bob kept toasting me with a "here's to another 60 years." Ha! Now, that's a laugh. I know I feel pretty good, but another 60 is stretching it a bit, don't you think?

I decided to spend my birthday at the place I love the most - Esalen Institute on the Big Sur coast. I turned down a party. I just couldn't get behind the idea of a celebration this year. My sister insisted, Bob insisted, Sherry insisted, Carole insisted, but I resisted and prevailed. No way. I didn't want any part of it. A 60th birthday may be a time to celebrate, but with my son, Paul, dead less than a year, I just couldn't do it. Believe me, Paul wouldn't have cared, but, I did. I just didn’t feel right having a party this year. Anyway, why should I worry about what they all wanted. I’m the one who turned 60. 

I knew I made the right decision as we drove North on Friday. As soon as we got past Santa Barbara I started to relax, sink deep into my seat, take some long deep breaths and watch the beauty of the world go by. The verdant hills looked like they had been painted with sweeping brush strokes of mustard yellow, the rows of newly planted grape vines stood tall and proud as little toy soldiers, and the clear sky except for a few Georgia O'Keefe clouds beckoned us up the Coast. It looked like just plain heaven to me. And I figured that if it were this good on the road, what would come next would be even better.

It wasn't easy getting Bob to agree to go. Esalen, created in the 1960s where people gather to expand their minds, relax their souls and work on their bodies; eat fresh, healthy food, and soak in the hot springs baths while watching the waves of the Pacific, is my place. I've gone there many times without him, and he is very happy to have it that way. But, this time he really had no choice. Of course, I offered bribes. He got to choose the workshop, he got to ogle all the naked women in the hot baths and he got to spend as much time with marvelous me as he wanted all weekend long. There would be no interruptions - no telephone, no email, no exercise classes, no work. What the hey? He took the bribes, and in his inimitable way, he came along and participated fully and willingly. 

Out of the four workshops offered this particular weekend, we decided to take the massage intensive. What a concept! We signed up to spend about nine hours taking turns rubbing each other’s bodies. How bad could that be? At one point I was laying on the table that stood right in front of a huge dome-shaped picture window, the sun was streaming in, a cool breeze was washing over me, the ocean was roaring below, and I was being massaged by not one man, but two. The instructor had decided to come by and give Bob a lesson in using a slow hand and an easy touch. Oh, and don’t get any ideas. They each were doing a leg. Even so, if I could have my way, that moment would still be going on. 

The truth is, there’s not a lot at Esalen to complain about. Sure, the digs are a little primitive, sure, there is no room service, sure, all calls have to be made on a pay phone, sure, meals are served buffet style and before shoving our dirty dishes into the kitchen area we have to scrape any leftovers into the compost pot. That’s about it. There is so much more to like. The breathing sounds of the ocean as it laps against the rocks below are hypnotic, the pungent smells of fresh herbs and pine tickle the senses, the fertile ground that produces grapefruit size roses along side rows of emerald green vegetables boggles the mind, and, the hot baths soothe not only the body, they heal the soul. It’s like no where else I’ve ever been. It’s where I can go to be completely relaxed and at peace. I made the perfect decision. I wouldn’t have wanted to turn 60 any place else.

Twitter at its best

I’ve been listening to Scott Simon’s distinctive voice on NPR’s “Weekend Edition” for years. After reading this article I know he also has a distinctive, elegant, and loving voice via Twitter. For those of us who haven’t yet found a way to take full advantage of Twitter, read Simon’s tweets about the last days of his mother’s life. After reading them myself, I had to share this article with you.

Here’s the link if you want to read the entire Los Angeles Times article. You can also listen to Simon's words on the NPR site.

latimes.com

NPR's Scott Simon: A vigil for his dying mother, tweeted with love

By Matt Pearce

This post has been updated, as indicated below.

6:18 PM PDT, July 29, 2013

Scott Simon, a radio host for NPR’s “Weekend Edition,” gave his mother, Patricia Simon Newman Gilband, a very public farewell.

Gilband appeared with her son on NPR in 2008, when the pair bantered as she shared stories from her life in Chicago. “Well, I think the thing I have learned from you -- number one, you're a beautiful companion,” Gilband told Simon then. “You've always been a lot of fun. No matter what age, we all got -- we were compatible. We got along beautifully. … You've never lost your childlike sense of enthusiasm.”

For the last few days, Simon, who has more than a million followers on Twitter, has been tweeting odes and observations from his mother’s bedside in an intensive-care unit in a Chicago hospital, where she was dying.

“It is a remarkable and moving moment,” fellow NPR host Peter Sagal of “Wait Wait ... Don’t Tell Me!” tweeted Saturday. “Pay attention.”

On Monday at 7:17 p.m., Simon tweeted twice:  "The heavens over Chicago have opened and Patricia Lyons Simon Newman has stepped onstage."

"She will make the face of heaven shine so fine that all the world will be in love with night."

A few more of Simon’s tweets:

I just want to say that ICU nurses are remarkable people. Thank you for what you do for our loved ones.

All hospitals should have roll-out chairs in ICU rooms so loved ones can spend night w/ patients & not sleep on floor.

I am getting a life's lesson about grace from my mother in the ICU. We never stop learning from our mothers, do we?

Tnx for all but wishes for my mother in ICU. Her anthem, more than ever, is But I'm Still Here. She inspires us all.

Our friend Wen Huang dropped by ICU to read to my mother from his book. She smiles, "Haven't we had a lovely day?"

I consider this a good sign: mother sez when time comes, obit headline should be Three Jewish Husbands, But No Guilt.

My mother drifts to sleep listening to Nat's Unforgettable. I keep things light, but moments like this hard, if sweet.

Thanks for all good wishes. Mother says, "We can get through this, baby. The hardest part we'll be for you when it's over"

I tell my mother, "You'll never stop teaching me." She said, "Well don't blame me for everything."

My mother is breathing, finally sleeping. Docs asked what priority is. I just want to take her to sit in our favorite park.

No real sleep tonight. But songs poems memories laughs. My mother: "Thank you God for giving us this night & each other"

Mother: "I don't know why this is going on so long. I'm late for everything I guess."

I don't know how we'll get through these next few days. And, I don't want them to end.

When my mother woke briefly I sang her My Best Girl. She replied w/ You Are the Sunshine of My Life. Broadway in the ICU.

I just realized: she once had to let me go into the big wide world. Now I have to let her go the same way.

I think she wants me to pass along a couple of pieces of advice, ASAP. One: reach out to someone who seems lonely today.

And: listen to people in their 80's. They have looked across the street at death for a decade. They know what's vital.

Oh, and: Oh earth, you're too wonderful for anyone to realize you. It goes too quickly.

In middle of nights like this, my knees shake as if there's an earthquake. I hold my mother's arm for strength--still.

Her passing might come any moment, or in an hour, or not for a day. Nurses saying hearing is last sense to go so I sing & joke.

I know end might be near as this is only day of my adulthood I've seen my mother and she hasn't asked, "Why that shirt?"

[Updated, 6:17 p.m. July 29: This post has been updated to reflect the fact that Scott Simon's mother died about 7:17 p.m. Chicago time.]

All direct quotes are shown in italics.