Margaret Shepherd - The Art of Civilized Conversation: A Guide to Expressing Yourself With Style and Grace

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

This book could not have been written without the conversations I shared with many of my favorite people. I want to thank them here.

First, I owe a debt of gratitude to Sharon Cloud Hogan, Colleen Mohyde, and Trish Dalton Medved, the kind of coauthor, agent, and editor that every writer dreams of.

I am grateful to other people who gave their time generously:

Ken Morse, who fosters civility every day at MIT. Marilyn Brandt, Jeanne Lauer Williams, and Lilian Kemp, for their enduring friendship and interest. David Friend, Zoe Friend, Lily Friend, Miriam Friend, Geoffrey Shepherd, Gordon Shepherd, Sherman Lewis, and Tom, Kiernan, and Liam Hogan, for their family support.

Sophia Ainslee and Lauran Niegos of Cranes Paper Company, and Michael McCurdy, Bob Lauer, Stephanie Loo, Vimala Rodgers, and Nancy Mairs, for their expert advice and personal testimony. The reference staff at the Boston Public Library for their help in tracking down citations. Lindsay McGrath, Leonie Luterman, and Ruth Owen, for their special wisdom as hospital chaplains. Jeanne Wei, MD, and Erlene Rosowsky, PsyD, for their insights into talking with older adults. Elizabeth Willingham, for her words of wisdom on family dynamics. Ann Densmore, EdD, for her advice on talking with children.

And thank you to all other friends, relations, colleagues, and bystandersboth willing and unawarewho talked and listened while this book took shape.

Introduction

ONE PERSON walks into a caf, sits down to a cup of coffee in silence, finishes it, and goes back to the same old day. Two other people walk into that caf, sit down to two cups of coffee, have a good talkand go on their way with fresh energy, comfort, and insight. Simply by connecting them, conversation has changed them. And thats the definition of art. Civilized conversation is an art that transforms everyday life into something richer. It can engage your mind, excite your imagination, and expand your view of the world.

Just as a civilized conversation can get the morning off to a great start, it can enhance your work life all through the day and invigorate an evening of social life. If you enjoy the art of conversation with your family and friends, you will also shine at breakfast with a client, lunch with coworkers, and dinner with your boss. Its the Swiss Army knife of social skills that anyone can learn to use. Take it with you wherever you go, and youll be equipped to turn a seatmate into a confidant, an interviewer into an employer, and an acquaintance into a friend. As an accomplished conversationalist, youll be welcomed everywhere; everyone loves good conversation because it is fun.

Conversation, which is a craft as well as an art, requires only a little talent and a lot of practice. You dont have to be Michelangelo, just a good mechanic. The more you practice, the better you get and the more pleasure it brings. Anyone can refine the art of civilized conversation with virtually anyone else, regardless of dissimilarities in age, status, job, family, or abilities. Good talking skills can help you bridge distances and differences of opinion with people you want to stay close to. If youre new in town or starting a new phase of life, it can smooth the transition. Whether you are beginning to speak English or learning to use it better, the art of conversation will help you with exactly which words to say and when.

This book will help you excel at conversation. It will show you how to talk and listen betterand find more pleasure in doing both. It holds dozens of helpful ideas that will sweeten, smooth, and strengthen your social life so you can look forward to your day from the first good morning to the reflections you share over an evening meal. If you usually fear that you will bungle an introduction at a party, this book will provide you with enough opening lines to knit a safety net. These suggestions will help you enjoy meaningful exchangesnot just fulfill social obligations. They will help you delight in social reparteenot just survive it. By the time you reach the last page of this book, you will be the kind of sparkling conversationalist who also makes other people shine.

What Civilized Conversation Is and Is Not

Where I grew up in the Midwest, when you get together with someone, you dont just talk; that would be commonplace. Nor do you converse; that would be pretentious. Instead, you visit. You can visit on the phone and visit on the street. Lets just visit with each other awhile means that you welcome each other to a space youve created just by talking. Conversation doesnt get much better than that.

Conversation lets you be an artist every time you open your mouthor shut it. As Robert Louis Stevenson said, The most important art is to omit; the key to being a master conversationalist is to listen at least as much as you talk. Just as the other arts include pauses in a dramatic play, white margins around printed text, and space between a singers phrases, conversation is about silences as well as about words.

In addition to listening well, the other simple principles of civilized conversationdont ramble, dont gossip, dont bore, and disagree carefullyare not arbitrary demands of etiquette; rather, they are based on caring about yourself and about others. Etiquette and manners are not out-of-date rules. Instead, they are generally accepted guidelines for making everyone comfortable enough to connect.

Good conversation is classy, humane, practical, universal, and, when well done, seemingly effortless. It can also be defined by what it is notcivilized conversation is not the same as reciting, confessing, negotiating, scolding, or interviewing. It does not involve notifying, debating, or issuing orders, nor does it include baiting, shouting, hurling personal insults, contradicting, grand-standing, or interrupting. It does not require a referee. It is most surely not what people hear on many television and radio talk shows: that is performance art of particular emptiness, and the worst example of how to converse.

Good conversation rarely occurs when one party is not paying reasonable attention. In fact, courtesy is crucial to the very existence of a civilized exchange. By that I dont mean that you must always trot out the proper protocol or the perfect words, but you must connect somehow with the other person. Conversation is much less dignified if one person is phoning, instant messaging, e-mailing, reading, watching television, wearing headphones, humming, or staring into space. Your actions reveal to the other person exactly what you consider most important. Your concentration on other tasks can dilute the conversation, especially if you are not making eye contact with the person with whom you are talking.

Civilized conversation can take place, however, while you are riding in a car, listening to some background music, playing cards or a board game, golfing, gardening, hiking, doing dishes, or sitting in a hot tub; the conversation is often just less intense. Some people find it easier to relax if they are doing something unimportant while they talk, or if they sit side by side when eye contact may seem too intimate. These settings are fineas long as the other person knows that you are really focusing on him or her. In fact, some of the very best talk happens when people are sitting around a table and savoring a good meal.