Anne Enright: What is the trait you most deplore in others? — FLAPSS

The question

What is the trait you most deplore in others?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

A verbatim standing question in The Guardian's rotating Q&A questionnaire, documented across respondents and years.

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Anne Enright

Novelist and short-story writer

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here

I find it really interesting the way people are drawn to power, usually male power, sometimes in its dark mode. I wonder what they get from it. My experience of bastards is that there is very little material benefit gained from being in their company, though you feel there might be, any minute. Or you get something for a while and then the polarity switches. It’s a huge con. Trump made the mechanism clear – in this, I think he is a timely figure.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

Others on this question

View all 210 →

Charles Collingwood

Not listening to me.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 8 March 2025 source ↗

Laziness, lack of empathy, lack of humour.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 December 2025 source ↗

Cruelty. I don’t see the point.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, October 2024 source ↗

Inefficiency. Whiners.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, August 2022 source ↗

More from Anne Enright

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Question What is the worst job you have done? Craft & work

When I was 17 I took on a class of six-year-olds for a week. When the Angelus rang at noon, they stood up in silence and I realised I was supposed to recite the prayer, which I did not know. I said: “There will be no Angelus today because of that child fidgeting at the back.”

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

Question What did you want to be when you were growing up? Identity & self

When I was seven I wanted to be a nun. When I was eight, I wanted to be a boy so that I could be anything I wanted. Also, of course, I wanted to be Samantha in Bewitched.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

Question What is one of the best or most worthwhile investments you have ever made — of money, time, or energy? Money & investment

Remember, if you sit at your desk for 15 or 20 years, every day, not counting weekends, it changes you. It just does. It may not improve your temper, but it fixes something else. It makes you more free.

Recorded The Guardian Review, 20 February 2010 source ↗

Question When were you happiest? Time & hindsight

A few weeks ago, we spent a long weekend going around West Cork, and I was so happy it amazed me. My husband doesn’t always make me happy around the house, but add a road and some scenery and the combination can be very powerful.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

Question Which living person do you most admire, and why? Values & belief

Catherine Corless, who spent her own money to secure birth certificates for the unrecorded dead children of the Tuam mother and baby home.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

Question What most recently made you cry? Identity & self

When Kellie Harrington won gold for Ireland in the boxing at the Paris Olympics I pumped out the briny.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

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