The Proust Questionnaire is a questionnaire about one's personality, first popularized by the responses given by the French writer Marcel Proust. At the end of the nineteenth century, when Proust was still in his teens, he discovered a questionnaire in an English-language album belonging to his friend Antoinette, daughter of future President Felix Faure, entitled "An Album to Record Thoughts, Feelings, etc." At that time, it was a fad among wealthy English families to answer such a list of questions that revealed the tastes and aspirations of the taker. Proust answered the questionnaire several times in his life, always with enthusiasm. The original manuscript of his answers of 1890, at the time of his volunteer internship or some little time afterwards, titled "by Marcel Proust himself," was found in 1924. It was auctioned on May 27, 2003 for the sum of 102,000 euros. The television host Bernard Pivot, seeing an opportunity for a writer to reveal at the same time aspects of his work and his personality, traditionally submitted his guests to the Proust questionnaire at the end of the French broadcast 'Apostrophes'. Inspired by Bernard Pivot, James Lipton, the host of the TV program Inside the Actor's Studio, gives an adapted version of the Proust Questionnaire to some of his guests. A similar questionnaire is regularly seen in a section of the magazine Vanity Fair, answered by various celebrities.
The questionnaire
The version of the questionnaire answered by Proust differed somewhat from the English original; he translated it into French, changed or ignored some of the questions, and added others.
| Original questions | Proust version | Proust's answers 1890 |
|---|---|---|
| Your favorite virtue | The principal trait of my personality | The need to be loved and to specify the need to be cherished and spoiled much more than the need to be admired.|- |
| Your favorite qualities in a man. | The quality that I want in a man. | Some female charms. |
| Your favorite qualities in a woman. | The quality that I want in a woman. | Virtues of Man and the franchise in the camaraderie. |
| Your chief caractheristic | ||
| What you appreciate the most in your friend | What I appreciate most about my friends. | Be tender for me, if a person is exquisite enough to give a great interest in their tenderness. |
| Your main fault | My main fault | Do not know, not being able to "want". |
| Your favourite occupation. | My favorite. | Enjoy |
| Your idea of happiness | My dream of happiness. | I am afraid it is not high enough, I dare not to say, I'm afraid to destroy it in the telling. |
| Your idea of misery. | What would be my greatest misfortune? | Not having known my mother or my grandmother. |
| If not yourself, who would you be? | What I want to be. | Moi, as people I admire would like me |
| Where would you like to live? | The country where I want to live. | One - where some of the things I would like take place as if by an enchantment and where tenderness would always be shared. |
| Your favorite color and flower. | The color that I prefer. | The beauty is not in the colors, but in their harmony. |
| The flower that I like. | The sienne- and after, all. | |
| Your favorite prose authors. | My favorite authors prose. | Today Anatole France and Pierre Loti. |
| Your favorite poets. | My favorite poets. | Baudelaire and Alfred de Vigny. |
| Your favorite heroes in fiction. | My heroes in fiction. | Hamlet. |
| Your favorite heroines in fiction. | My favorite heroines in fiction. | Berenice. |
| Your favorite painters and composers. | My favorite composers. | Beethoven, Wagner, Schumann. |
| My favorite painters. | Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt. | |
| Your heroes in real life. | My heroes in real life. | Mr. Darlu, Mr. Boutroux. |
| Your favorite heroines in real life. | ||
| What characters in history do you most dislike. | ||
| Your heroines in World history | My heroines in history. | Cleopatra. |
| Your favorite food and drink. | ||
| Your favorite names. | My favorite names. | I did that at one time. |
| What I hate the most. | What I hate most of all. | What's wrong with me. |
| World history characters I hate the most | Kings that I despise the most. | I am not educated enough. |
| The military event I admire the most | The military that I admire most. | My volunteering! |
| The reform I admire the most | The reform which I consider the most. | |
| The natural talent I'd like to be gifted with | The gift of nature that I would like to have. | The desire and seduction. |
| How I wish to die | How I want to die. | Best-and loved. |
| What is your present state of mind. | My present state of mind. | The trouble for me of thinking to answer all these questions. |
| For what have you most fault toleration? | Fouls that inspire me the greatest indulgence. | Those that I understand. |
| Your favorite motto. | My motto. | I'm afraid doesn't bring me bad luck either. |
