Marcel Proust Character Questionnaire
This questionnaire was invented by the noted French author Marcel Proust. Lisa Wood used this questionnaire to interview the main character of Burnt Offering, Lucinda Jolie.
The audio of the interview will be available soon.
LW: What do you consider your greatest achievement?
Luce: I should hope that I have many achievements in life to come. I would hate to limit myself to my greatest achievement so young in life.
LW: What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Luce: I do not believe that happiness should be perfect. It would make all the rest of your moments seem rather bleak if you’d experienced one moment with absolutely no flaws.
LW: What is your current state of mind?
Luce: I am excited about all of the opportunities that Gallia has laid out before it; I’m nervous about my role in the future of our city; and I’m proud of all the Gallian citizens who have pulled together to make our colony great.
LW: What is your most treasured possession?
Luce: My most treasured possessions are the memories I have of my life with my family. I would give up everything in this world to keep myself near to them.
LW: What or who is the greatest love of your life?
Luce: A lady doesn’t talk of such things.
LW: What is it that you most dislike?
Luce: I dislike sloth. It is important for the success of our colony that we all pull our own weight.
LW: What is your greatest fear?
Luce: Losing the ones that I love. I know I cannot hold on to my loved ones forever, but the memories of them keep them alive in me. So long as I have those memories, I have the ones I love.
LW: Which living person do you most despise?
Luce: Hate is such a wasteful emotion. It does not do to dwell on the bitter dregs of an old cask of wine when a new one is so easily accessible.
LW: Whose are your heroes in real life?
Luce: My mother and my father: they dedicated their lives to the betterment of Gallia, and I hope that I can cast even a shadow of their influence over our great colony.
LW: Which living person do you most admire?
Luce: I admire all living people. Life, I’ve found, is quite difficult and I find it commendable simply to drag yourself back into it every day.
LW: What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
Luce: Can a virtue be overrated? Perhaps, it can if the virtue is demonstrated only for show, and not to do actual good in the world.
LW: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
Luce: I’d much rather change the world by being the best of myself every day.
LW: How would you like to die?
Luce: I’d rather not for a while. But when it is my time to die, I think I would like to die like my mother with bravery and courage and in sacrifice for those I love.
LW: If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be?
Luce: I think when people we love die they never really leave us so long as we keep their memories alive. I’d like to believe that there are people who love me so dearly that I will never truly die, but if I must leave this body, I will, I hope, at least return as a memory.
LW: What is your motto?
Luce: My motto came from my father: Those who can must do. If you have within you the ability to help someone, or to make this life even remotely easier for them, then you must do it. It is by these words that my colony has prospered all these years despite being the smallest in the Terra II system, and a desert ecosystem no less.