replies

May 16, 2010
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REPLIES
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FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH BETTY MIDLER
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Q: What is the quality you most like in a man?
A: Guts.
Q: What is the quality you most like in a woman?
A: Balls.
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FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH BRIGITTE BARDOT
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Q: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
A: Nothing about me. Everything about others.
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FROM AN INTERVIEW
WITH SALMAN RUSHDIE
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Q: What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
A: Faith.
Q: What is your greatest fear?
A: Irrelevance.
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See VANITY FAIR'S PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE (New York, 2009)
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May 17, 2010
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MORE REPLIES TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
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MAUREEN DOWD
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Q: How would you like to die?
A: After my enemies.
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DUSTIN HOFFMAN
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Q: On what occasion do you lie?
A: When people ask , “How are you?” The real answer I save for my therapist.
Q: Who are your favorite writers?
A: Nineteenth-century Russians.
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WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY
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Q: What or who is the greatest love of your life?
A: J.S. Bach.
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SIDNEY POITIER
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Q: Who is your favorite hero of fiction?
A: Jason Bourne.
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WALTER MATTHAU
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Q: Which historical figure do you most identify with?
A: Jack the Ripper.
Q: What is your motto?
A: “F*ck you.”
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DAVE BRUBECK
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Q: If you could choose what to come back as, what would it be?
A: J.S. Bach.
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GORE VIDAL
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Q: Who are your heroes in real life?
A: Dr Kevorkian.
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May 18, 2010
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MY ANSWERS TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
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Q: What is your idea of perfect happiness?
A: Playing Bach on the organ in an empty church.
Q: What is that you most dislike in others?
A: Intolerance.
Q: What do you consider the most overrated virtue?
A: Charm and a perfect set of white gleaming teeth.
Q: What do you consider your greatest achievement?
A: The fact that I have been writing for thirty-five years and I am still alive. Very few Armenian writers can say as much.
Q: Your favorite word?
A: Compassion.
Q: Your favorite writers?
A: Plato, Chekhov, Toynbee, Sartre, Zarian, Koestler, Simenon, Chandler, Lesley Blanch...among many others.
Q: Who are your heroes in real life?
A: Socrates, Diogenes, Gandhi.
Q: Your favorite heroes of fiction?
A: Jack Bower, Jason Bourne, Bugs Bunny, and Walker in POINT BLANK.
Q: Your happiest experience?
A: Receiving a letter from Saroyan saying he reads everything I write.
Q: Who is the greatest love of your life?
A: After my mother, J.S. Bach.
Q: Which words or phrases do you most overuse?
A: “If you know what I am saying,” when I don't know what I am saying.
Q: On what occasion do you lie?
A: When asked by a writer to assess his work.
Q: How would you like to die?
A: Suddenly, in my sleep.
Q: Which talent would you most like to have?
A: The ability to sing Neapolitan serenades.
Q: What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?
A: Self-doubt.
Q: What is the trait you most deplore in others?
A: Subservience.
Q: What is your most marked characteristic?
A: Timidity.
Q: Which living person do you most despise?
A: Flunkies, hirelings, and brown-nosers.
Q: What is your favorite journey?
A: Greek islands, Italian cities, South-American jungles, and Caucasian mountains.
Q: If you were to die and come back as a person or thing, what do you think it would be?
A: A concert pianist.
Q: What do you regard as the lowest of misery?
A: To be a homeless refugee in a poor country under an authoritarian regime in time of war.
Q: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
A: To be more diplomatic in my dealings with my fellow men.
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May 19, 2010
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MORE ANSWERS TO
THE PROUST QUESTIONNAIRE
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Q: Your favorite occupation?
A: Reading.
Q: Your greatest fear?
A: Losing my eyesight.
Q: Where would you like to live?
A: Since I can no longer live in the Armenian ghetto in Athens where I spent my early years – because it was torn down – in Venice.
Q: Your most treasured possession?
A: The complete organ and piano works of J.S. Bach.
Q: Your favorite saying?
A: “When the house is finished, death enters.”
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DAVID STEINBERG
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Q: If you could choose what to come back as, what would it be?
A: Frank Sinatra's dick-- the early years.
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ON THE RADIO
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“They don't eat bagels in Israel.”
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SHRINKS
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I am told I hate myself. If I do, it may be because I can't imagine anything more repulsive than being infatuated with oneself.
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Everything I say about Armenians has been said before, and if not said, felt.
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