The Art of Conversation - Catherine Blyth [98]
ME: Well?
YOU: Well.
ME: So!
YOU: So.
ME: Okay then!
YOU: Okay.
ME: Bye.
YOU: By the way . . .
Can you hear the questioning uplift in the first speaker, the downbeat of the second? In effect, you are engineers, running through final items before clearing the plane for takeoff (“Check?” asks Engineer One; “Check,” confirms Engineer Two).
Similar exchanges occur to tread water when a conversation stalls. They’re all opportunities: to raise another subject or prize open an exit. Just wait for a “So . . . ,” introduce a turning-point word—“well,” “listen,” or “now”—then say it’s been great talking, but, sadly, you must go....
If ever you wonder “Why are we still talking?” it is time to say how much you have enjoyed it, then good-bye. A little thing, like hello, it joins the dots of our increasingly dotty lives.
Knowing when to leave, wrote salon moralist, La Bruyère, is “an art that vain men rarely acquire.”
Like the art of conversation, you cannot attain it in vain.
Goodbye.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book has enjoyed indecent amounts of luck. Here are some of the reasons why.
First thanks must go to my magnificent agent, Eugenie Furniss, out of whose conversation the idea sprang, and to my inspiring editors, Eleanor Birne, Erin Moore, and Helen Hawksfield. I’m grateful to all at John Murray, especially Nikki Barrow, Sara Marafini, Roland Phillips, James Spackman, and the other unseen hands who helped usher this book to the shelves; to Bill Shinker, Jessica Sindler, Amanda Walker, Lisa Johnson, Carrie Swetonic, and the rest of the Gotham team; to William Morris, in particular Shana Kelly, Rowan Lawton, and Jay Mandel; and to Henryk Hetflaisz and Remy Blumenfeld, who live in the realm of the possible and make it contagious.
Many individuals provided help and guidance, including: Emily Anderson, Jessica Axe, the late Shereen Baig, Nicola Barr, Andrew Barrow, Vick Beasley, Chris Blackhurst, Heidi Blyth, Jenny Blyth, Stephen Blyth, Vivian Blyth, Caroline Bondy, the staff of the British Library, Helen Burdock, Jackie Burdock, Emily Charkin, Kay Chung, Pete Clark, Vin De Silva, Andrea di Robilant, John Elliott, Theo Fairley, Max Gadney, the late Frances Gillam, Jane Gillam, the late Michael Gillam, Vince Graff, Clare Grafik, Louise Haines, Louise Harding, Carolyn Hart, Robin Harvie, Emily Hay-ward, Alice Horton, James Hughes-Onslow, Virginia Ironside,
Gillian Johnson, Alex Key, Irma Kurtz, Leonard Lewis, James Lewisohn, Michael Mack, Oliver Mack, Helen Marshall, Francesca Maurice-Williams, Harriet Maurice-Williams (a fine classicist whose help I corrupted), Walter Meierjohan, the staff of the North Kensington Library, Emma Parry, David Patterson, Chrystalla Peleties, Harry Phibbs, Gerrie Pitt, Dominic Prince, Rose Prince, Robert Procopé, James Ribbans, Andrea Rossini, Laetitia Rutherford, Professor Sophie Scott, Amanda Shakespeare, Christopher Shakespeare, Francesca Shakespeare, John Shakespeare, Lalage Shakespeare, Nicholas Shakespeare, Matthew Sturgis, Ben Summerskill, Petra Tauscher, Anne Turner, Dominic Turner, Susan Urquhart, Edward Venning, Sarah Venning, Marilyn Warnick, John Williams, Hywel Williams, Andrew Wilson, Bee Wilson, Katie Wood, Beverly Yong, Toby Young.
Not forgetting what is owed to some wonderful teachers: Brenda Atkinson, Dick Clarke, Gary French, John Glover, Dr. Paul Hartle, Hazel Hill, Dr. and Dr. Holding, Neil Jarvis, Tom Morris, Dr. Jonathan Smith, and most of all, Professor Germaine Greer.
Studying conversation can feel like chasing butterflies, but some ace netters eased my task. Thanks to the interviewers, reporters, and analysts who catch idiosyncrasies on the wing.
And lastly, to my husband, Sebastian Shakespeare, who has had enough conversations about conversation to be forgiven for wishing no more, but is still talking to me.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Aitchison, Jean. The Articulate Mammal. London: Routledge, 1998.
Andreae, Simon. Anatomy of Desire. London: Little, Brown, 1998.
Arendt, Hannah. The Human