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

195 answers answered between 1930 and 2026 one of 25 in The Q&A

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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.

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Public figures who have answered a question like this elsewhere. Quoted from the source shown, not written for FLAPSS.

Read by field Everyone Science and medicine 2 Arts and letters 164 Politics and public life 14 Business and finance 4 Technology 1 Sport 9

Read by age Any age Before thirty 3 In their thirties 33 In their forties 36 In their fifties 50 In their sixties 43 Seventy and beyond 25

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Johanna Konta British tennis player

When I was five, I wanted to be a cleaning lady; when I was nine, I wanted to be the world’s number one tennis player.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 30 June 2018 source ↗

Adwoa Aboah British fashion model

I wanted to be a cooker. Not a cook: I wanted to actually be the stove.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 2 March 2019 source ↗

Oti Mabuse South African dancer

A paediatrician, then I was like, I can’t dissect frogs! Then I fell in love with making things and understanding how things work.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 July 2019 source ↗

@aliabbasi builder

A pilot