How to Parry Direct Questions

Personal questions can be unsettling unless you develop enough sophistication to cope with them gracefully. Sometimes, they are brutally asked with intent to wound. A naturally witty person knows well enough how to reply. An author who was asked by a jealous contemporary, “Who wrote your book for you?” replied, “Who read it to you?”. This is the Socratic question-for-question defense which had best left for professionals.

The safer way is to pretend that no offense was meant – and often the poser of personal questions is just a blunderer and does not really mean to be malicious. If you are a woman who does not care to advertise your age, whether you to be 25 or 47, you might reply to someone who asks how old are you (when it is none of his business), “You know, the women in my family have always been ageless and I like to keep it that way.”  Women are expected to lie about their age, anyhow, so even if you bared your sensibilities and told the truth, chances are, your interrogator would, mentally add another five or ten years.

When no tactful answer seems to suffice and the personal probing goes on, the only solution is to be quite frank. Say, without getting angry, “I know you don’t realize it, but that is a personal question I don’t feel willing to answer.” If he then takes offense, he deserves to.