Lightning In A Bottle: What Makes A Speech Great?

Here is Clarence B Jones, contributor to Martin Luther King’s speeches, on the subject of great oratory. His key point is spot on:

… the measure of or index of a good speech is not merely the words that are festooned together and spoken – presumably by someone who has a good delivery or even an exceptional delivery – but the extent to which the text of speech, the substance of the speech, is responsive and addresses the major issues of the time

A few days ago I made a related point in a comment over at the Guardian:

A great speech?

It needs an occasion which is either obviously ‘great’ at the time (eg that huge rally addressed by Martin Luther King for his ‘I have a dream’ speech) or one which seems great in retrospect because the speech was so strong. Plus a simple, memorable great idea which somehow catches the moment (and defines the moment) and/or a great rallying-cry.

Watch on YouTube the Ronald Reagan speech at the Berlin Wall: Reagan was not a great orator, but his words (“Tear down this Wall!” inserted by him against official advice, of course) were superb. The video is also interesting in showing Chancellor Kohl on the podium laughing and chatting and obviously not interested(!).

Reagan’s speech to WW2 war veterans on the top of the cliffs of the Normany landings is also brilliantly done – understated and incredibly moving.

That speech shows another point: part of great oratory is being authentic. Sounding as if you are speaking to people from your heart and your mind, openly and fearlessly.

President Obama’s speeches have lost their magic, now sounding indeed as if his speechwriters are combing to and fro for ancient oratorical gimmicks rather than delivering real substance. Authenticity lost. For an example of a speech which was wildly over-praised as great at the time but had some serious errors and looks pretty sickly in retrospect, try his Cairo speech: https://charlescrawford.biz/blog.php?single=1001

By the way, two of the very greatest speeches of all time are in the film Mars Attacks. The one by the US President J Nicholson (“Why can’t we all just get along?”), and the dopey hippy one at the end, touching in being so utterly gormless but heartfelt.

Mr Jones is especially interesting on the famous ‘I have a dream’ speech. The key passages were improvised!

What happened was that as he got through reading the first nine paragraphs of prepared texts to which I contributed some language and concepts, he was interrupted by his favourite gospel singer, Mahalia Jackson, who was on the podium with him, and he paused in the middle of his speaking and she shouted: ‘Tell them about the dream, Martin! Tell them about the dream!’

At which point he put aside the written text. I was standing about 15 yards behind him, and I saw him, I read his body language and I said to the person standing next to me: ‘The people assembled here, they don’t know, it but they’re about ready to go to church.’

… I say to people that Martin Luther King, Jr was the only person I have ever observed or known – and I’ve never ever seen or heard anyone do it since – who could compose a speech extemporaneously in real time and while he was speaking.

Like we use computer skills, he could cut and paste in his mind from previous speeches or writings and he could insert those excerpts into his real time speech.

It was an extraordinary ability. It was a transcendental experience to be there. It was like watching lightning captured in a bottle.

But look at the first lines of that speech which Mr Jones drafted:

… this is a paraphrase, it’s not exact: ‘We’ve come here to the foot of this great monument to redeem a promissory note that has been returned unpaid for insufficient funds.’

The promissory note is the guarantee of negroes’ freedom under the Declaration of Independence, and he says: ‘I refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the vaults of justice.’ That’s language that I crafted

Would any speech-writer today write something like that to open an address? No.

A long sentence. The words are heavy and difficult (redeem, promissory note, vaults, insufficient). Wouldn’t most people there have no idea what he’s talking about?

Maybe that’s the point.

The speech shows a man in front of a mass of relatively less educated people who is confident in himself. Someone who knows and loves words, and who is comfortable about using complex ideas and language to express them.

Someone who is authentic, and not prepared to dumb down his language to the level of his audience in what amounts to a patronising way, even at the cost of not being fully understood at each phrase: