Talking by listening

Talking It Up

Russell Baker in the New York Review of Books: The conversation was good on the raft that carried Miss Watson's Jim and Huckleberry Finn down the Mississippi. With quiet evenings darkening over the river the talk drifted whimsically, as good conversation should. The earning power of kings was discussed, and the misfortune that required Frenchmen to talk in French. Social problems were explored: Wouldn't the racket of quarreling wives and colicky children in a fully populated harem make a husband's life intolerable?

A fine exercise in philosophical speculation took place when Jim challenged the received opinion about the wisdom of King Solomon. As Mark Twain tells it, Jim not only questioned the very nature of wisdom, a question worthy of Socrates, but also lightened this ponderous exchange with tongue-in-cheek raillery. Solomon's famous proposal to cut a child in two and give half to each of two women who claimed to be its mother was proof that Solomon lacked good sense, Jim said, for "what use is a half a chile?"

These discussions between two socially disreputable Americans—a runaway slave and a seldom-washed boy —may seem at first glance not at all what Stephen Miller has in mind in his meandering and entertaining essay on "the art of conversation." Miller lavishes a great deal of attention on Europeans of the powdered-wig era and this, combined with his frequent references to an "art" of conversation, may leave art-shy readers with the impression that good talk is strictly for the elite. Not so. Huck and Jim—and who could be less elite?—enjoy some of literature's memorable conversation by intuitively following principles laid down by masters of the art. Thus:

Both participants listen attentively to each other; neither tries to promote himself by pleasing the other; both are obviously enjoying an intellectual workout; neither spoils the evening's peaceable air by making a speech or letting disagreement flare into anger; they do not make tedious attempts to be witty. They observe classic conversational etiquette with a self-discipline that would have pleased Michel de Montaigne, Samuel Johnson, or any of a dozen other old masters of good talk whom Miller cites as authorities.

Baker's piece on conversation starts promising enough. But then it all goes downhill, as a different Russell seems to have written the rest of the piece. It's too bad, because I think compared to most, Baker really gets the importance of good conversation and in his personal life probably contributes more than his share to good talk.

The problem though is I'm not sure Baker, in print at least, is able to rise above who he his. And who he is is an increasingly narrow segment of society whose time for shaping the national discourse has passed, and for whom as a result it must seem as if nobody talks anymore--when in result it's just the conversation has moved on to another room and they're unwilling or unable to follow.

For example, he cites Twain approvingly, but not only fails to note that those kinds of conversations between the races were purely fictional for most of history, but doesn't find it odd that what he cites as his highest conversational ideal is a white man's idea of what a conversation between a poor white boy and a grown black man would be like.

No need to mention who leads Twain's conversation, and on whose terms their idyllic rafting adventure is undertaken. Funny also that Baker fails to mention Huck's threats in the book, when talk and things don't go his way, to turn Jim in. Great conversation is inherently dependent on freedom and equality. You cannot praise a conversation the governor has with a condemned man on the eve of his execution, no matter how sparkling the bon mots or astute the observations.

The two are simply not in the same game. The power disparity is so great that what you have is not an exchange of ideas, but one man deluding himself into thinking he's having a light evening out slumming and displaying his common touch and picking up insights, while the other's frantically paddling to stay afloat. How enjoyable is a game of poker if someone's actually got his life at stake?

I think white men have historically had this problem of walking away congratulating themselves on what a fine exchange of ideas has just taken place and how open-minded they are, when the other party is leaving as fast as is polite breathing a sigh of relief; or rolling their eyes, or shaking with exhaustion, or even running in fear.

It's striking how unperceptive and oblivious white men can be; maybe it's why they can say, with all apparent honesty, they had no idea coworkers were being discriminated against, or harassed, everybody seemed to be having such a great time.

Given Russell's burden of a tin ear, it's no wonder he can write without irony:

In Western culture, conversation as art probably reached its highest level in eighteenth-century England and France. (It would be interesting to know if complex ancient cultures in Asia and Africa evolved conversational traditions comparable to the West's, but this is beyond the scope of Miller's essay.)

I think it's probably not just interesting, but probably vital, to know how Eastern cultures valued conversations if you're going to write an essay about conversations without prefacing the word at every turn with 'those that I aware of'. Baker's essay has the tone of the universal, when really it's quite limited.

Which goes to the obvious point--how can the greatest conversations in Western history come out from clubby groups of upper-class white Euorpean men talking just to each other? It's like comparing Central Park to Yellowstone--no matter how carefully and artfully cultivated a park is, it's still small, fake, and stilted, with all sorts of artificial shortcuts behind the scenes. Not to mention it's inherently stultifying over time, even with the best of groundskeepers--and the man who stands in the midst of Sheep Meadow warbling about the magnificence of untrammeled, provocative, dangerous, mind-expanding nature is properly looked at as a provincial at best, blind at worst.

It's like any time someone starts a conversation by talking about the good old days of the '50s, I feel like stopping them and saying, you mean 'the good old days for white males who are perfectly happy to live in a society where all around them blacks, hispanics, Asian Americans, and women were beaten down with impunity, and the only things in your head were what other white males contributed'?

(The sad thing is shot up with truth serum a large number of people in the 21st century would still nod their heads and say yup, those were the good old days.)

This line made me laugh, too:

Like most of the arts, conversation may come naturally to an untutored primitive while a person of education, power, and position may find it impossible. Miller has no theory about this. Could it simply be a matter of having the right genes?

Not sure why he assumes: elites should have better conversations, but they don't always, so therefore it must be something beyond their control, i.e genes.

In my experience it's the complete opposite--cab drivers and doormen are much more interesting to talk to in most cases than their customers because they're unguarded, speak their minds and actually come in contact with a wide range of people who even if they often treat them like they're part of the furniture, that at least gives rise to interesting stories they're happy to relate to people who ask. There's none of the careful sizing up and weighing of words that people of education, power and position put between themselves and the person they're talking to, not to mention the air of busy-ness these poor souls wear as a shield against their world.

And then there's this:

Miller is pessimistic about the future of the conversational art in America and finds few witnesses who are not. The common explanation at the moment is the "polarized" state of our politics, which is said to be so advanced that sensible folk scarcely dare speak on any subject more arresting than food and weather for fear of igniting some human powder keg in a conversation-ending spew of rage. This is to surrender to an excess of politeness which, as La Rochefoucauld observed, can become a kind of slavery.

Attacks on 'political correctness' and its so-called stifling impact always fail to mention that in the past, sure maybe behaviour--for some--was more unfettered, but today we'd probably tag much of what spewed forth racist and sexist, in addition to boorish. The targets of the old-style devil-may-care conversational bomb-throwing--a kind of verbal terrorism, if you will--usually weren't allowed at the table, so there was nobody to object or stand up for themselves, and thus no fuss.

People today disagree about a lot of things and discussions can get uncomfortably heated because social discourse includes a greater diversity of background and thus opinions than ever before. But I don't think anyone can seriously disagree that there's more open and honest clash today than ever before in human history.

Hell, what were the 60s and 70s but one long national conversation? White men with crew cuts may not always have liked the long-haired men/women who seemed to be doing all the talking; they probably hated what was being said since much of it was directed at them, but if anyone cut short the conversations it wasn't the kids. Birmingham and Grant Park and Kent State were, if nothing else, examples of talk being cut short with clubs and guns.

And then Russell goes after Westerns!

Conversation has always had enemies in America. Consider the popularity of the laconic hero. He is a figure extensively delineated in western movies, especially those directed by John Ford, who boasted of how few words he permitted his actors to speak.

It makes me wonder how many John Ford films he's seen, certainly not The Searchers or The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.

Yes, unlike many Hollywood films of Ford's and our time, there's no idle chatter, no obvious banalities--Ford limits what his actors say because first and foremost he believed he was working in a visual format, and secondly because pairing limited words with his carefully-chosen images is the best way he knew of to communicate, which happens to be the ultimate point of any conversation.

Everybody's different--to criticize Ford because he's no Woody Allen misses the point that the two very different people made very different films, and Ford's as pre-eminent in his chosen genre as Woody is in his. Conversation's not just words-- gesture and context speak volumes. And actually, I'd argue Ford said more than Woody, especially when you consider the themes Ford took on in his movies (racism, gender roles, civilization and war), compared to Woody's very Manhattan self-absorption.

Then Russell really shows his age, with these paragraphs:

In this world men who talk a lot are thought to be comical, ineffectual, or effeminate. Real men keep their thoughts to themselves. If they feel an emotion they are expected to suppress it. In movies, of course, they might express it by firing a gun, blowing up a bridge, or throwing a punch. In real life they can only clench their jaws and silently ponder a couple of cold ones until it passes over.

In this world? It's no longer 1970, there's been quite a lot of water over that bridge since Alan Alda. Maybe among a certain type of white men silence is mistaken for strong, (rather than coldness, emotional stuntedness, or just personality), but I'm not sure too many people in 21st century America have such a narrow canvas upon which to paint 'real men.'

In this media-dominated age voice is power--and white males are nothing if not interested in power. Is Donald Trump not a real man? Dan/Tom/Peter? Heck, even Arnold has jumped into the most loqacious of vocations, seemingly unencumbered by his accent.

Baker goes on to sketch the geneology of his strong/silent straw man:

As Miller explains, the style descends from the Spartans, who inhabited the Greek region of Laconia. The word "laconic" derives from the Greek word lakonizein, which meant to speak in the distinctive Spartan way. Among other things, this involved keeping speech to a minimum. "Spartans thought men who talked a lot were not likely to be men endowed with military spirit," according to Miller.

He describes an oppressively male, homoerotic, military culture in which the only lively art was warfare. Boys were taken from their parents at the age of seven to begin military training and were expected to have a male warrior as lover after the age of twelve. Spartans apparently took pride in avoiding and even being unable to understand complicated discussion. The laconic style has never made for lively conversation."

Sparta's 'homoerotic' culture as an example of a non-communicative society? Odd to toss that in, in our age of sassy and loud gay men; more extrapolation would've been nice.

There's nary a mention, by the way, in Baker's essay of the role the Wills of our time have played in our national discourse, which seems so odd. No mention of Ellen (or the likes of Oprah or Spike Lee either).

I wonder if Russell's real gripe is he doesn't understand or feel a part of all the conversations that are swirling around him. From the perspective of older white men who are used to being masters of the universe--and having nothing but short and direct interactions with anyone not a part of their clubby circle (Yes, sir. Right away, sir. How high, sir?)--maybe something does seem lost in this messy, free-wheeling world of ours.

I wonder if what they've lost isn't conversation, but a certain type of circular stroking of egos and mutual hear hears that indeed, you don't hear much of anymore. The convinial setting of the club probably did impart white men with a feeling of ease and well-being. And indeed, I can see how they miss the comfortable feeling of sitting around a table and, in the course of an evening over whiskey and cigars, circling and ticking through the world, chewing over problems in mouthfuls that within the boundaries of their known world may indeed have felt daring, but ultimately at night's end pushing back from the table with a sense of time well-spent.

I'm sorry if they've lost this sense of fullness, but invite them to stop pining away for the good-old-days of valium and open their eyes to the vibrant, multicultural world that they are a part of, still.

I may be a bit harsh--after all, it must be hard for an ex-Timesman, and one who no longer has a regular column from which to pontificate, to write about conversation without bemoaning the good old days.

And actually, I've always liked Russell Baker the columnist, and it's not his fault he's a man of his age. Heck, if you don't get it, hip-hop does sound just like a lot of shouting, and the cacophony of immigrant-driven voices in our big city can seem like babble.

But really, Russell, if nothing else, how can you not toss in someting about how the Internet and blogs inherently make this the golden age for conversation? Kids--your grandkids among them--are writing more and at an earlier age than ever before; there are no barriers to entry; you can hear from people anywhere in the world; and nobody can forestall anyone else from speaking.

How can this not be better than a few white men at their club in 1872 London talking amongst themselves? Heck, Passepartout always seemed more interesting than Phileas Fogg to me.

You've got to have more than people expressing their views to have conversations, of course. But at least now we all have access to more authentic thoughts and ideas to start the conversation with, and a much wider choice of conversational partners.

If we so choose.

Cover of Around the World in 80 Days from Golden Picture Classic.