Rose Tremain
English writer
Working as the assistant to an agony aunt on a women’s magazine. When we didn’t get enough heartbreaking letters, we made them up.
What is the worst job you have done?
Question
Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?
Identity & self
Question
What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Craft & work
Question
How close have you come to death?
Death & what remains
Question
What is the worst thing anyone has said to you?
Failure & regret
Question
What keeps you awake at night?
Daily life
Question
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Values & belief
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
The Guardian's long-running Q&A repeatedly asks this standing question, with minor tense variation.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
I cleaned the toilets at the local pub every Saturday morning.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 November 2024 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 229 →
Francesca Martinez
British comedian
I’ve liked all my jobs, amazingly.
Terence Conran
British restaurateur and designer
When I was 19, I washed up in the basement of a Paris restaurant that stank of rotted food. I did it for six months, until I was promoted to vegetable boy.
Siri Hustvedt
American novelist, essayist, poet
I was a floor model briefly at Bloomingdale’s in New York in 1979. I hated it. When no one was watching, I would lock myself in the toilet and read.
More from Bryn Terfel
View profile →Thinking that singing makes me fit.
I loved my 1 minute 40 seconds singing at the coronation of King Charles. I was the most nervous I’ve been.
In 2006, I went fishing for red snapper in the Gulf of Mexico. On the way back, one of the engines caught fire and then we had one engine for 70 miles. Slowly but surely, we got to Baton Rouge in the darkness but then got very close to a very large passing ship – they didn’t see us and we didn’t see them.
“You’re a wonderful musician but a terrible friend.” It was Daniel Barenboim, the famous conductor, because I didn’t have time in the calendar to work with him.
Absolutely nothing.
Unfriendliness.
More on craft & work
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- How do you know when a piece of work is finished? 67 answers
- What do you do when you feel creatively blocked or stuck? 66 answers
- How does a new work begin for you? 63 answers
- How much rewriting or revision do you do? 46 answers
- What is the part of your job that people would be surprised is most of your job? 41 answers
Also answered this
Ricky Wilson, Sue Perkins, Martin Kemp, Charlotte Church, Björn Ulvaeus, Craig David
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