The shop was a kind of talk show that flowed around the engaging manner and well-timed questions of my mother; and as a boy not much taller than the counters behind which I used to pause and eavesdrop, I learned much that would be useful to me ywars later when I began interviewing people for articles and books.

I learned to listen with patience and carem and never to interrumpt even when people were having grat difficulty in explaining themselves, for during such halting and imprecise moments (as the listening skills os my mother taught me) people often are very reavealing -what they hesitate to talk about can tell much about them. Their pauses, their evasions, their sudden shifts in subject matter are likely indicators of what embarrases them, or irritates them, or what they regard as too private or imprudent to be disclosedto another person at that particular time.

Extract from Portraits and Encounters, by Guy Talese