From the Proust Questionnaire: Part Un

Anyone who has ever read an issue of Vanity Fair is no doubt familiar with the Proust Questionnaire, a series of questions once asked by the famed writer Marcel Proust himself. Since the magazine has embarked on the trend of featuring the questionnaire, everyone from Karl Lagerfeld to Lee Radziwell has completed the survey. I thought it would be interesting to pose the same questions to my best friend, and fellow blogger and bibliophile, Emily. Emily and I have also considered tackling Proust's "Remembrance of Things Past" next year, so it seemed especially fitting that she would participate. And be sure to check out her blog, http://bucketofparts.blogspot.com/, which is a revered blog on life after an organ transplant (with posts on books, the ballet, art, and more sprinkled in for good measure).

Proust believed that the questionnaire provided insight into the private thoughts and feelings of friends, associates, et al.

This is the first installment from the questionnaire, so we'll see if he was correct.

The Fashion Vagabond:

1. What is your most marked characteristic? My sense of style

2. What is the quality you most like in a man? Intelligence, especially being well-read

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

4. What do you most value in your friends? Support

5. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? Being a consummate perfectionist

6. Favorite occupation? writer and editor

7. What is your idea of perfect happiness? Walking the Popple (my much beloved chihuahua)

8. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? Not having the desire to travel and see the world

9. In which country would you like to live? England (again!)

10. Who are your favorite writers? Iris Murdoch, Virginia Woolf, D.H. Lawrence, Paul Theroux, Joseph Epstein, Robin Givhan, Dostoevsky, Sylvia Plath, Plum Sykes

11. Who are your favorite poets? Anne Bradstreet, Czeslaw Milosz, Ovid, Christina Rossetti

12. Who is your favorite hero of fiction? the White Rabbit

13. Who is your favorite heroine of fiction? Clarissa Dalloway

14. Favorite composers? Beethoven, Mozart, Hayden, Tschaikovsky, Schubert

15. Favorite painters? Monet, Renoir, Degas, Cezanne, El Greco

Emily:

1. What is your most marked characteristic? My voice

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

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

4. What do you most value in your friends? Loyalty

5. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? my impatience

6. Favorite occupation? opera singer

7. What is your idea of perfect happiness? Being able to stay at home, write, and practice music all day. And perform at night.

8. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? nothing

9. In which country would you like to live? England

10. Who are your favorite writers? Austen, Dickens, Jodi Picout, Oscar Wilde, Shakespeare, C.S. Lewis, Alexander McCall Smith, Richard Paul Evans, Gregory Maguire, Virginia Woolf

11. Who are your favorite poets? Shakespeare,Oscar Wilde, Christina Rossetti, John Milton, Dante

12. Who is your favorite hero of fiction? Mr. Darcy

13. Who is your favorite heroine of fiction? Elizabeth Bennet

14. Favorite composers? Beethoven, Rachmanioff, Barber, Verdi, Phillip Glass, Frank Wildhorn

15. Favorite painters? Vermeer, Renoir