What did you want to be when you were growing up?

Originally asked

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

This is a standing question in The Guardian's decades-long The Q&A and also recurs independently in career and life interviews.

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

Recorded Bozoma Saint John said elsewhere, not written here
An obstetrician.

The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 October 2017 source ↗

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John Lewis U.S. Representative from Georgia, 1987–2020; Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 1963–1966
When I was growing up I wanted to be a minister. I wanted to preach.
Recorded Academy of Achievement interview, Chicago, 10 June 2004 source ↗
A criminal pathologist. Then I saw a show called Quincy ME and realised I just wanted to play one on TV.
Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 30 August 2025 source ↗
Anne Enright Novelist and short-story writer
When I was seven I wanted to be a nun. When I was eight, I wanted to be a boy so that I could be anything I wanted. Also, of course, I wanted to be Samantha in Bewitched.
Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 September 2024 source ↗

More from Bozoma Saint John

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Question What is the worst advice you received that you followed anyway? Failure & regret
But it was really – it came across sinister. And for me, I really did listen to it. I accepted it. I tried to implement that. The reason why I say it’s the worst advice I ever received was that it was damaging to me because she was totally wrong. ... And so, when somebody who is successful tells you to do something, you try to do it, even when it damages you.
Recorded Tim Ferriss, The Tim Ferriss Show podcast, 4 February 2018 source ↗

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