Lying. Let’s not call it “untruthful.” Or “factually inaccurate.” I don’t even call it bullshit, because I like bulls. And bulls need to shit. So you can’t hold that against them. Let’s call it what it is: lying.
What is the trait you most deplore in others?
Question
What is the part of your job that people would be surprised is most of your job?
Craft & work
Question
Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?
Identity & self
Question
What is something everyone in your world agrees about that you think is wrong?
Values & belief
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.
That they don’t give way quickly.
Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, May 2013 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 197 →
Terry Gross
Radio interviewer
The inability to stop talking about themselves when they’re not being interviewed.
Too many times I had people try and make decisions for me. The assumption that I needed that was a big mistake!
Bullying, flakiness, rudeness, lack of humility, being patronising and ungenerous.
More from David Hockney
View profile →To get the most out of the world around you you’ve got to really look hard. Most people out walking in the woods don’t really look. They just glance around. They scan. Before I start a painting I spend a lot of time looking and thinking, I go out in the car and pull a chair out of the boot and sit in the woods. I sit there and smoke and just look.
Recorded
The National, Interview in the courtyard of the Royal Academy, London, The National, 1 January 2012
source ↗
That I give way too quickly.
I thought I was a hedonist at the time, but when I look back I was always working. I am always working. I work every day. I never give parties; I never gave them.
More on values & belief
- Which living person do you most admire, and why? 406 answers
- What is something everyone in your world agrees about that you think is wrong? 79 answers
- What are you unwilling to optimise? 30 answers
- What have you come to understand about what it means to be human? 14 answers
- What is the most overrated virtue? 10 answers
- What do you need to believe in order to get through the day? 9 answers
Also answered this
Chaka Khan, Cyndi Lauper, Gina Lollobrigida, Julian Lennon, Sam Ryder, Michelle Collins
Search the directory for somebody in particular.
Explore further
- All values & belief questions
- The The Q&A questionnaire — 25 questions from the same format
- Explore the archive — by field, age, era, and subject