
Describing trade and cultural exchanges between countries bordering the Indian Ocean in A History of the World in 100 Objects, Neil MacGregor concludes that "seas usually unite rather than separate the people who live on their shores.
I have thought, though I am as guilty as most other people of neglecting it, that the value of silence in conversation is too much ignored. Today I find that Jonathan Swift is of the same mind. "They have a notion," says Gulliver of the Houyhnhnms, the superior race of horses, whom he encounters on the last of his voyages, "that when people are met together, a short silence does much improve conversation: this I found to be true; for during those little intermissions of talk, new ideas would arise in their minds, which very much enlivened discourse."
2 comments:
The title alone of this post is intensely inviting...
I thought so to and nearly let them stand on their own.
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