Talking Cure

This charming and well-written book aptly describes itself as an invigorating exploration of the pleasures and social benefits of conversation, arguably more important than ever at a time of decline in conviviality and collegiality. One striking illustration of this trend is the changing features of the author’s university staff club. She reflects that the great draw of an academic career used to be the possibility of conversing with a wide variety of people who loved ideas in an environment conducive to collegial sharing, as is still the case on high table at Oxford and Cambridge. She remarks that the atmosphere is now more competitive and politically charged. The faculty club used to offer three meals a day, but now only provides an indifferent (and poorly attended) lunch, while the bar closed decades ago. More broadly, this reflects the decline of a culture that supports humanistic values, also reflected in the closure of arts departments. University goals are now financial and bureaucratic, and professors are no longer seen as ‘unique individuals dedicated to the life of the mind and the free play of ideas’ (p. 162) – she is surely right in remarking that if such an ethos can be resurrected, collegiality will take care of itself, although pressures of time make this more challenging.

There is a congenial chapter on food, drink and conversation, with a couple of passages from Virginia Woolf characterising the then stark contrast between fare at men’s and women’s colleges; also a discussion of My dinner with Andre. I agree with Woolf when she says that ‘a good dinner is of great importance to good talk. One cannot think well, love well, sleep well if one has not dined well.’ (p. 44) Readers will also appreciate Montaigne’s observation that ‘the most fruitful and natural exercise of the mind, in my opinion, is conversation; I find the use of it more sweet than any other action in life.’ The first sentence of the author’s own definition is worth quoting: ‘Good conversation mixes opinions, feelings, facts, and ideas in an improvisational exchange with one or more individuals in an atmosphere of goodwill.’ (p. 20) She has a particularly soft spot for French culture, highlighting the history of the salon presided over by cultured women, and more modern café culture. Traditional gentlemen’s clubs in London, she notes, embody a very different ethos, but most are now mixed.

Other chapters discuss Freud’s talking cure, features of bad conversation, literary coteries like the Bloomsbury Group in a wide-ranging discussion of schools of talk, the rise of the novel with dialogue, conversation as public entertainment, conversation on campus, and Shakespeare on Zoom, parsing the medium’s advantages and drawbacks. In her conclusion, she argues that ‘only when conversation is free and flourishing does society thrive in the ways that most of us value.’ (p. 177) She goes on to discuss censorship in historical totalitarian regimes, leading eventually to self-censorship and corresponding restriction of thought. In this connection, she could have mentioned the recent rise of AI-powered digital censorship where governments and tech companies collaborate, and consequent self-censorship on the part of those understandably concerned not to lose their professional positions and funding. Finally, in discussing the character of Pierre Bezukhov she writes that he represents the core of good conversation – ‘a state of mind that is alert and receptive without feeling that a definitive answer must be found.’ (p. 181) I highly recommend this book as a civilising and leisurely read.