Paul Theroux: What has been your biggest disappointment?

What has been your biggest disappointment?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

This exact question recurs in The Guardian's institutional Q&A pool.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Paul Theroux said elsewhere, not written here

Political leadership generally.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 25 May 2013 source ↗

Others on this question

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Toyah Willcox English singer-songwriter, actress and television presenter

The world doesn’t reward talent, it mostly rewards those who are connected.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 13 April 2019 source ↗

Roger Taylor English musician, songwriter, and record producer

Not getting solo records playlisted on the BBC.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 9 October 2021 source ↗

Danny Alexander British banker

Not playing first-class cricket.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 December 2013 source ↗

George H. W. Bush 41st President of the United States, 1989–1993

When I lost a race for the United States Senate, I thought the world was going to end for me politically, and 18 years later I was elected President of the United States. The biggest disappointment was that I wasn't able to communicate properly to the American people — with the proper conviction and the proper ability — where the country really stood. The pessimists, the naysayers, the change-wanters overwhelmed me, and I wasn't good enough. I wasn't articulate enough to have the country understand that we weren't in a recession, that we were in a rather booming economy in the last half of my presidency. That was a personal shortcoming, a failure on my path.

Recorded Academy of Achievement interview, Williamsburg, Virginia, 2 June 1995 source ↗