Questions to ask yourself

21 questions to ask yourself about the 1960s

Most people lived next door to the sixties rather than in them. These questions find out which: where they were living, what they wore, what reached their town and what they only read about. Answer by voice, not keyboard. Then transcribe. Your first draft is already done.

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 a week's shopping cost when you were first married, and where did you buy it?An exact figure lets the reader feel the decade in their pocket.
2. What did a haircut, a cinema ticket or a pint cost when you were twenty?They will know it to the penny. Use the number.
3. Where did you go dancing, and what night of the week was it?The dance hall is where most of the love chapters begin.
4. What did you wear on a Saturday night out, and how long did it take to get ready?The getting-ready is a scene the book can open on.
5. Was there a band or a singer your parents could not stand? Did you play them louder?
6. Did you ever see anyone famous play live? What do you remember that nobody else would?
7. What was the first car the family had, and where did it take you?The first car redraws the family's whole map.
8. What was your first flight like? Where were you going, and what did you wear for it?
9. Where were you living in 1965, and who with?An address and a housemate fix the decade to a life.
10. What were you doing the day you heard Kennedy had been shot?Everyone of that age has this scene; the book wants theirs, not the newsreel.
11. Where did you watch the moon landing, and who was in the room?The room matters more than the moon.
12. What did you make of the Beatles at the time? Who in your house disagreed?
13. How short were the skirts, how long was the hair, and what did your mother say about it?The mother's line, verbatim, is the whole generation gap.
14. What was your weekly wage in the 1960s, and what did a night out take out of it?Wage against night out is a ratio the reader understands instantly.
15. Did the 1960s reach your town, or did you only read about them? What actually changed on your street?Most people lived next door to the decade, not in it. That is the honest chapter.
16. What did you drive, or ride, or wait for at the bus stop in the 1960s?
17. What did you argue with your parents about in the 1960s that you would now side with them on?
18. What arrived in your kitchen in the 1960s that your mother never had: a fridge, a washing machine, a packet of something new?A new appliance is a changed daily life, and daily life is the book.
19. Who did you want to look like in the 1960s, and how close did you get?
20. What did you believe the world was about to become in 1968? What did it become instead?
21. Was anyone you knew sent to a war in the 1960s? What did their mother do while they were away?tender

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 yourself: their place in history, habits, routines and work, loves and tastes, how they look and move, contradictions, the story that shows them, objects, places, food, music, where they came from, how others saw them, beliefs and values, wants, fears and wounds, key relationships.

When people ask these. a milestone birthday; retirement; a diagnosis; the first grandchild.

More questions to ask yourself

• All questions to ask yourself
• Questions to ask yourself about their childhood
• Questions to ask yourself about family history
• Questions to ask yourself about love and marriage
• Questions to ask yourself about their work
• Questions to ask yourself about faith and beliefs
• Questions to ask yourself about food and the kitchen table
• Questions to ask yourself that are funny
• Questions to ask yourself about hard times

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