Recently through some introspection and self-reflection I realized what I really like about books: the dialogue between main characters. I am fine reading encyclopedias and other reference books for trivia and information, but when it comes to pure reading or character development (so mainly fiction), what I appreciate the most is realistic dialogue between characters. Sure prose and artsy descriptions win Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes, but I'm just a sucker for real people talking, I suppose, which is why I appreciated Nikola Yoon's book "Everything Everything" about Maddy being confined at home in a hermetically sealed environment and not being to go outside ever. I'm not sure I agree with the message of the book (spoiler: distrust the mom!) but the interplay between the characters had me turning the pages. I guess I'm just a voyeur, always trying to eavesdrop in other people's conversations or understand everybody else's lives. Other books in my years of reading that had great dialogue: The Redwall books (fiction), Michael Lewis books where he recounts real conversations between people like Sam Bankman-Fried, the Elon Musk book where musk tells various underlings that their work is not acceptable and they could hand in their resignation, many Hercule Poirot books (little gray cells) and of course, the Harry Potter books.... come to think of it, that's probably one reason Joanne (J.K.) Rowling's creations are so popular: her characters spring to life through dialogue that's befitting of British schoolchildren, and everyone can relate to that talk.
If there was an app that tracked how many words I spoke during the day, I bet it'd remind me to meet my target word count and encourage me like the fitness app to "keep going" and "you can still achieve your daily goal, Robert!" I don't think I meet the quotas on most days sitting at home doing work, and sadly even when I go outside it's just to order food, show my boarding pass to the airline operator, tell the Uber where I'm going, etc. There's not much genuine interaction.
Which is probably why I crave talking to people, and what today's society lacks: live interaction. Dialogue is Greek for "through" and "words," which is different from what I always though it was, "di" meaning 2 people. MJ and I met a couple in the elevator of our "Only Strangers in the Building" condo and the couple was carrying suitcases somewhere. After an awkward strange pause now familiar to probably everyone who uses elevators because either someone has their headphones in or is deep in trance-like state looking at their phone or otherwise nonresponsive, I broke the ice (I'm generally pretty good at doing that when I feel like engaging) by asking, "where are you going?" Turns out the couple (the lady was very obviously pregnant) was going to the hospital to deliver their baby! Wow what a big momentous moment in their lives to walk in on! Yet even in such a momentous occasion (or perhaps because of the momentous occasion) they didn't want to talk in the elevator until I jumped in. Am I that unfriendly-looking? Is social interaction that frowned-upon nowadays?
I think there's some magic in the creation of dialogue. There's a natural flow that you can develop with someone that fuels a good conversation: both giving each other room to talk, allowing each other to finish one's thought, asking follow-up questions at the appropriate time, making eye contact when necessary to receive emotional cues to see how the other person feels about the topic. When I was a kid I was really bad at it: not knowing what the other party wanted in a conversation, not knowing what was inappropriate to talk about, not catching the draft of the other speaker, and not knowing enough about what other people were talking about to continue the conversation in a clever way. With plenty of training in my 20's in various social groups, however, I got better and better, and I felt I finally honed my skills as an adult at parties, work meetings, happy hours, random people I sit next to on airplanes.....only to have the world turn into phone world and nobody want to engage in dialogue anymore; it's like studying for a test for many years and never actually taking the test. It's a little discouraging really; I learned like 5 different languages, yet the world doesn't talk anymore. Why is that, you ask? I'm at a loss for words.
No comments:
Post a Comment