THIS book is based on the assumption that, since conversation is life's most habitual and significant avocation, any, even a slight, improvement in it is of incalculable social, economic, and moral value.

Its thesis is not that everyone can become a brilliant conversationalist, but that everyone can get better and better in this matter of talking — and should.

Here is what you will discover inside...

★ Improving Our Talking Life
★ The Mechanics and Rhetoric of Conversation
★ The Voice and Diction of Conversation
★ The Background for Good Conversation
★ Special Gifts, Devices, and Techniques
★ Personality Adjustment for Conversation
★ The Do's and Don'ts of Agreeable Conversation
★ When and How to Talk of One's Self
★ The Weather and the Words in Passing
★ Gossip, Shoptalk, and Small Talk
★ Politics, Art, Religion