Using knowledge as a weapon.
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Question
How close have you come to death?
Death & what remains
Question
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Identity & self
Question
What is your greatest fear?
Identity & self
Question
What is the worst thing anyone has said to you?
Failure & regret
Question
How would you describe yourself in three words?
Identity & self
Question
When were you happiest?
Time & hindsight
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.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
I’m irritated by critics and academics who dismiss poetry that is popular, comprehensible or humorous.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 January 2026 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 197 →
Rose Tremain
English writer
Talking in cliches. We have the most economic, resonant and versatile language in the world, yet so many people use it in a dull and boring way.
Ardal O'Hanlon
Irish comedian and actor
Lack of self-doubt.
Passive aggression.
More from Roger McGough
View profile →A picnic on the beach at Seaforth during the war. Somehow I managed to wriggle through a barbed-wire fence and run across a minefield. My teenage aunt Kat bravely followed suit and rescued me.
I had dreams of becoming the first scouse pope. Unfortunately, the girls got to me first.
Losing track (see above).
A lady came up to me in Tesco last year and said, “Excuse me, but didn’t you used to be Roger McGough?”
Unimpeachable, nonpareil, self‑effacing.
Last Sunday when all the family came round to celebrate my 88th birthday. (Or was it Saturday. Or the week before, perhaps?)
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