Talers

“ Thus all do who have a speech on the tongue which ought to be interpreted: they proceed with the discourse as planned and begun, and leave to others the task of expressing in words what is in their thoughts. ”

“ The great want of the people, for the most part, tongue-tied farmers, seemed to be to hear talk, to have something said, and wherever a few brisk words gave promise of a lively dialogue, the speakers were at once surrounded by a dense throng of listeners. ”

“ Now, the dialogue is a discourse carried on by way of question and answer, on some one of the subjects with which philosophy is conversant, or with which statesmanship is concerned, with a becoming attention to the characters of the persons who are introduced as speakers, and with a careful selection of language governed by the same consideration. And dialectics is the art of conversing, by means of which we either overturn or establish the proposition contended for, by means of the questions and answers which are put in the mouths of the parties conversing. ”

“ I do not think that what are called ‘plays for the study’ need detain us. It is really only a question of degree in each case. They either approximate closely to the true stage-play or, on the other hand, they are really books in which, by artifice and often by an effort which is rather too visible, those parts that would naturally assume a narrative form, are presented in the guise of dialogue—or rather not so much of dialogue as we are now discussing it, but, as I should say, of speeches which are, in essence, either narrative, or argumentative, or reflective, or hortative in character. ”

“ Whether the subject of the Dialogue is love or rhetoric, or the union of the two, or the relation of philosophy to love and to art in general, and to the human soul, will be here- after considered. And perhaps we may arrive at some conclusion such as the following — that the dialogue is not strictly confined to a single subject, but passes from one to another with the natural freedom of conversation. ”

“ Our young English travelers generally distinguish themselves by a voluntary privation of all that useful knowledge for which they are sent abroad; and yet, at that age, the most useful knowledge is the most easy to be acquired; conversation being the book, and the best book in which it is contained. The drudgery of dry grammatical learning is over, and the fruits of it are mixed with, and adorned by, the flowers of conversation. ”

“ Or to be more explicit, is conversation an art or a gift? The answer must certainly be an art, for nature never gives that which study accomplishes. And by study you can become a master of speech—you can make words a veritable torch, illuminating you and your surroundings. But words alone mean very little. It is the grouping of words, expressions, phrases; the combination of thoughts that make real conversation. ”

“ There is but one defect in literature,—that the talk is all on one side, so that we are listeners, as at a sermon or a lecture, and not sharers in some antique symposium, our own brows crowned with flowers, and our own tongues loosened with wine. The exercise of the tongue is wanting, and to some it is an imperious need, so that they will talk to the most uncongenial [Pg 30] human beings, or even to parrots and dogs. ”

“ Contrast with these the conversations in Tristram Shandy—to my mind some of the finest and, scientifically regarded, most perfect dialogue in English literature. Every character who speaks contributes—really contributes, and is not merely a feeder or a foil. Each has his own mind, his own point of view, and manfully and independently maintains it. ”

“ An exception may be made of sentences of transition, indicating the relation between the parts of an exposition or argument.
In dialogue, each speech, even if only a single word, is a paragraph by itself; that is, a new paragraph begins with each change of speaker. The application of this rule, when dialogue and narrative are combined, is best learned from examples in well-printed works of fiction.
10. As a rule, begin each paragraph with a topic sentence; end it in conformity with the beginning. Again, the object is to aid the reader. ”

“ Of course I do, even most persistent and continuous hearers; whom I do not call pupils, but mere passing auditors of philosophers. Some come to hear, not to learn, just as we are brought into a theatre for pleasure's sake, to delight our ears with language, or with the voice, or with plays. ”

“ Don't you see, these people have a language all to themselves, a language they've invented just to cause despair in decent people who ask for a little dinner! Why, in every country on earth, when you open your mouth, snap your jaws, smack your lips and teeth, isn't that the world's most understandable message? ”

“ And they assemble not to eat, not even to dance, to the exclusion of all other gratifications, but to talk—to exchange ideas upon topics and incidents of passing interest—to receive and to communicate instruction, as well as enjoyment. And even the common people—whether eating their frugal evening repast at a little table placed in the street, or seated in groups in the garden of the Tuileries—how they talk! with what abandon—to use their own word—with what geniality, with what sprightliness! ”

“ Because he supplies us with food whereby our mind is refreshed after this noise in the forum, and with rest for our ears after they have been wearied with bad language. Do you think it possible that we could find a supply for our daily speeches, when discussing such a variety of matters, unless we were to cultivate our minds by the study of literature ”

“ The Art of Speaking then, so far as it regards only the manner in which our thoughts should be expressed, consists in action and Elocution; for action is the Eloquence of the body, and implies the proper management of our voice and gesture. As to the inflexions of the voice, they are as numerous as the various passions it is capable of exciting. ”

“ Instead they hear in their mind’s ear the sound of dishes, the murmur of conversation, and the clatter of knives and forks. When they have learned their lessons, and stand up to recite, they hear an inner voice telling them what to say. ”

“ No lecture then, but an informal talk, without text or subject—a vagrant ramble through such fields as tempt us. If we should find fruit, or even flowers, let us be thankful. If we encounter only briars, it will not be the first half hour we have wasted. ”

“ There lies the unspoken thing, present, omnipresent. Every time we converse, we seek to translate it into speech, but whether we hit, or whether we miss, we have the fact. Every discourse is an approximate answer: but it is of small consequence, that we do not get it into verbs and nouns, whilst it abides for contemplation forever. ”

“ Your speech is simple, my Master, but not theirs who talk of you. ”

“ The study of conversation serves to guide the public speaker not only in the free and natural use of his voice, enunciation, and expression, but also in his use of language. He will here learn to choose the simple word instead of the complex, the short sentence instead of the involved, the concrete illustration instead of the abstract. He will acquire ease, spontaneity, simplicity, and directness, and when he rises to speak to men he will employ tones and words best known and understood by them. ”

“ To deliver a SYSTEM in conversation scarcely appears natural; and while the dialogue-writer desires, by departing from the direct style of composition, to give a freer air to his performance, and avoid the appearance of Author and Reader, he is apt to run into a worse inconvenience, and convey the image of Pedagogue and Pupil. ”

“ This question of naturalness, which is germane to the whole subject of dialogue and not merely to stage dialogue, is one of the most difficult things to lay down any rule about. It is not easy even to get any working formula which is helpful. On the one side there seems to lie the obvious rule—that all dialogue ought to be natural, appropriate to the person in whose mouth it is put—not merely what in substance he would say, but also said in the way he would say it. ”

“ The children of to-day resemble those children of humanity, the first framers of articulate speech, and the children of a single household, if left to themselves, would have each his own jargon, his own dialect. ”

“ The daily newspaper and the magazines should not be allowed to usurp the place of conversation. If the art of talking is rapidly dying out, as some assert, we should do our share to revive it. We may not again have the wit and repartee, the brilliant intellectual combats of those other days, but we can at [Pg 99] least each have a cultivated speaking-voice, an interesting manner of expressing our ideas in conversation, and a refined pronunciation of our mother tongue. ”

“ In society one should always be prepared for impromptu conversation, or small talk, and should always have plenty of it in stock; that is, not the whole substance of the expected conversation, but subjects upon which you can converse at a moment’s notice. At receptions, teas, dinners, dances, or any other entertainment, the topics should be select, and the oral abilities prepared to discuss them in a free and familiar way. ”

“ When you see him on the platform of some great public meeting, pouring forth argument, appeal, sarcasm, anecdote, fun, and pathos in a never-ceasing flood of vivid English, you feel that you are under the spell of a born orator. ”

“ It was hitherto a custom of long standing among us that, when any earnest word was uttered, either to an audience or in print, those who never got beyond polite conversation took possession of the word and transformed it into an amusing subject of talk to relieve their boredom. ”

“ In these, speech is the direct (although, it is true, unconscious) expression of intelligence; for Noiré, on the other hand, it is the outcome of will. “Language is the result of association, of community of feeling, of a sympathetic activity which, at the outset, was accompanied by sounds...; it is the child of will and not of sensation.” Speech is derived from community of action, from the collaboration of primitive men, from the common use of their activities. When our muscles are in action, we feel it a relief to utter sounds. ”

“ All the knotty questions of the realm are referred to us, and, when they are discussed in the common hearing, each of us, without strife or objectation, sharpens his wits to speak well upon them, and produces, from a more subtile vein, what he thinks the most prudent and sensible advice.' This is in contrast with the turbulent, and sometimes stormy, discussions in the rising Universities. ”

“ THE INFORMAL DISCUSSION Informal discussion is the name chosen for the lecture or talk in the club or the classroom. It implies a rather small audience and familiar relations between audience and speaker. While the subject may be weighty, and the language may be necessarily of the literary or scientific sort, the style of speaking should be colloquial. It ought to bring the hearer pretty near to the speaker. If the subject and language are light, the speaking will be sprightly and comparatively swift. ”

“ Be assured then, the air, the gesture, the looks of a speaker, a proper accent, a just emphasis, and tuneful cadence, are full as necessary, to please and to be attended to, as the subject matter itself.
28. People may talk what they will of solid reasoning and sound sense; without the graces and ornaments of language, they will neither please nor persuade. In common discourse, even trifles elegantly expressed, will be better received, than the best of arguments homespun and unadorned. ”

“ It being now apprehended what persons are most fit to be shewn in Dialogue, the next inquiry will be, concerning their style or manner of expression. And this, in general, must be suited to the condition and qualities of the persons themselves: that is, it must be grave, polite, and something raised above the ordinary pitch or tone of conversation; for, otherwise, it would not agree to the ideas we form of the speakers, or to the regard we owe to real, known, and respected persons, seriously debating, as the philosophic dialogue imports in the very terms, on some useful or important subject. ”

“ Through speech after speech, strings of hollow abstractions are endlessly renewed as in a meeting of students in rhetoric for the purpose of practice, or in a society of old bookworms for their own amusement. ”

“ Now if we dip into this miscellany of things that figure and have figured in schools, if we turn them over and look at them, and seek to generalize about them, we shall begin to see that the most persistently present, and the living reality of it all, is this: to expand, to add to and organize and supplement that apparatus of understanding and expression the savage possesses in colloquial speech. The pressing business of the school is to widen the range of intercourse. ”

“ Among a primitive people conversation means either broken remarks about the material things of life—the food which is sorely needed and is hard to come by, the boat which is to be built, or the weapon which is to be fashioned—or else it takes the form of a monologue, in which the speaker tells some tale of his own or another's experiences to those who sit and listen. ”

“ The paper of the educated woman should be reasoned, ordered, and shapely, while every sentence should have its meaning. As John Synge said of a play: “Every speech should be as fully flavored as a nut or an apple.” ”

“ They also discover that dialogue must either reveal character or advance the story; and that it must be in keeping with the theme and maintain the tone used at the beginning. A commonplace dialogue must not suddenly become romantic in tone, and dialect must not lapse into ordinary English.
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The original plots the class offers later may have been suggested in many ways. Newspaper accounts, court reports, historical incidents, family traditions—all may contribute. Sometimes the student proudly declares of his plot, “I made it out of my own head.” ”