April 7, 2006

Can We Talk?

By CARLIN ROMANO

There is no such thing as conversation," Dame Rebecca West imperiously announced in The Harsh Voice (1935). "It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that is all."

West's decree hasn't stopped an exaltation of scholars from reifying the activity in recent years, even beatifying it as a saintly artifact of human culture.

Last year the Jewish Museum in New York mounted a stellar exhibition entitled "Jewish Women and Their Salons: The Power of Conversation" (with a

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