Questions to ask someone who is dying

16 questions to ask someone who is dying about their school days

School is the first place a person is seen by strangers. These questions get the teacher who was feared, the one who noticed, the game in the playground, the day they left and whose decision it was. Ask "what do you want people to know?" first and "what would you rather leave out?" second. Everything else follows from those two.

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 1 marked tender come last: ask them once, late, in person, with "or would you rather leave that?" in the question.

1. What did school smell like, sound like? Which teacher do you still think about?
2. How did you get to school each morning, and how long did it take?
3. What did you eat at school at midday, and who did you sit with?Who they sat with at eleven is the first friendship chapter.
4. Which teacher was feared, and what did they do to earn it?A feared teacher is a villain the reader will enjoy.
5. Which teacher noticed you? What did they say that you still remember?One adult who saw them is often the hinge of the early chapters.
6. What was the subject you were known for at school?
7. What could you not do at school, no matter how hard you tried?The thing they could not do is often the thing they spent a life making up for.
8. What was the punishment at your school, and did you ever get it?
9. What did you wear to school? Who made it, and who had worn it before you?Hand-me-downs are a family economy in one garment.
10. Tell me about a day you skipped school. Where did you go instead?The first truancy is the first choice they made alone.
11. When did you leave school, and whose decision was it?The leaving date explains the next twenty years.
12. Did you ever win something at school? What did your parents say when you told them?The parents' reaction is the real answer.
13. Who was the bully, and who stood up to them?tender
14. What did you do in the last week of the summer holidays, before school started again?
15. What did you learn by heart at school that you can still say?Ask them to say it. Recorded, it is a page by itself.
16. What did your children wear to school in the 1970s, and what did they beg you for that you would not buy?

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 12 of the things a writer needs about someone who is dying: key relationships, where they came from, habits, routines and work, how others saw them, the story that shows them, contradictions, wants, fears and wounds, their place in history, objects, places, food, music, temperament and humour, loves and tastes, their voice and sayings.

More questions to ask someone who is dying

• All questions to ask someone who is dying
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about their childhood
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about family history
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about love and marriage
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about their work
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about faith and beliefs
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about hard times
• Questions to ask someone who is dying for their advice
• Questions to ask someone who is dying about what they want remembered

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