Why Good Writers Aren’t Good Talkers & The Maltese Falcon

From The New York Times, Why Writers Aren’t Good Talkers, which is a brief review of “Except When I Write: Reflections of a Recovering Critic” by Arthur Krystal. Krystal’s answer to the question:

“Reading, study, silence, thought are a bad introduction to loquacity.”

Then there’s Sydney Greenstreet as Kasper Gutman talking to Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade about talking in The Maltese Falcon:

Kasper Gutman: You’re a close-mouthed man?
Sam Spade: Nah, I like to talk.
Kasper Gutman: Better and better. I distrust a close-mouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk and says the wrong things. Talking’s something you can’t do judiciously, unless you keep in practice.
[sits back]
Kasper Gutman: Now, sir. We’ll talk, if you like. I’ll tell you right out, I am a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk.
Sam Spade: Swell. Will we talk about the black bird?

“Talking,” in this case, was an effort to get to the point.

 

 

 

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