Questions to ask your great-grandparent

22 questions to ask your great-grandparent about love and marriage

Ask for the day, not the summary. "How did you meet" is the beginning; "what went wrong at the wedding" is where the book is. Have the great-grandchild ask the questions, even if you whisper them first. The answers are different when a child asks, and that recording is the one the family will keep.

How to use this list. Ask by voice and record it. One or two questions a visit is plenty; the follow-up ("Who else was there?" "What did she say?" "What happened the day after?") matters more than the next question. The 4 marked tender come last: ask them once, late, in person, with "or would you rather leave that?" in the question.

1. How did you meet, and when did you know? Tell me the actual day.A scene, not a summary.
2. What was the first fight about, and who gave in?
3. What did your parents think of them at first?
4. What did you wear on your wedding day, and what went wrong?Something always goes wrong. That is the story.
5. What did you call each other? Was there a name nobody else used?
6. What did they do that showed they loved you, without saying it?
7. What do you remember about the day your first child was born?
8. What did you worry about for us that we never knew?
9. Which house did you bring your first baby home to, and what did it still need doing?
10. Where did you go dancing, and what night of the week was it?The dance hall is where most of the love chapters begin.
11. What was the song at your wedding, and who chose it?Who chose it is the answer.
12. Where did you spend your honeymoon, and what did it cost?
13. What did you do on the first proper date, and what did it cost?The cost and the venue date the scene exactly.
14. Where did you live in the first year you were married, and what was wrong with it?What was wrong with the first home is the first shared story.
15. What is a habit of theirs that you have caught without meaning to?
16. What did you argue about in the twentieth year that you never argued about in the first?A marriage changes subject. The subjects are the chapters.
17. What did you learn about them from their family the first time you visited?
18. Who proposed, where, and what were the exact words?The exact words are a line of dialogue the book can quote.
19. Was there a time you nearly left, or nearly lost them?tender
20. Who did you love before that, and what happened?tender
21. Did you ever keep something from your husband or wife to protect them? Did it work?tender
22. Was there a child, a marriage or a love that the family does not know about?tenderAsk it only when you have earned it, and accept the first answer.

What these questions are for

A good book about a person needs more than facts. It needs the person on the page: how they talked, what they wanted, what they did when it mattered, the story that shows them. These questions cover 11 of the things a writer needs about your great-grandparent: key relationships, the story that shows them, their voice and sayings, how others saw them, objects, places, food, music, wants, fears and wounds, habits, routines and work, loves and tastes, their place in history, contradictions, loss and fate.

More questions to ask your great-grandparent

• All questions to ask your great-grandparent
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• Questions to ask your great-grandparent about faith and beliefs
• Questions to ask your great-grandparent about food and the kitchen table
• Questions to ask your great-grandparent that are funny
• Questions to ask your great-grandparent about hard times

Or see questions for everyone else, and how to interview a parent about their life.