ART OF SPEAKING

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 102, 1 May 1937, Page 21

ART OF SPEAKING

(To the Editor-i Sir,—ln last Saturday's HPost" (page 27, "News, Views, and Notes") there is quoted an article from.', the "Daily Mail," by Charles Benham,:1, entitled "A Plague of Whisperers." I peed it with great interest. The writei" : describes one of the great handicaps'! art presentday public gatherings of assorts and sizes, namely the inaudibility of many, in fact most, of the speakers to about 50 percent, of the audience* Mr. Benham attributes this to the* habit the speakers have of imitating th« "stage" and the present-i-jy methods of actors. He recalls that; Alexander was : rather negligent in thijs direction; whom .he means. by Alexapder i seems somewhat vague to me; pa:«sibly Alexander the Groat. *

Now when I- attend any j meeting I do not go just to fill up some spare time, but because I am interested in. the subject and want to htear and absorb the information, and receive my time's value. This X seldom do. Gettin? on in years, I find thfcrt the audibility of the speakers is becoming less, and have been studying several books on public sneaking to findi out if the speaker or the hearer is at ffault. After some study I decided thait about 93 per cent.1 at least1 of the blame belongs to the speaker. Then trie name of Alexander, mentioned abojre, reminded me of Alexander Watsan, an English Professor on Elocution; he ■ has written a book entitled "Speak Out," now in its fourth edition. ;"He emphasises in simple language ttnese necessary items of efficient public speak slowly, ] open your mouth, which includes your teeth. . ; ; , Now Mr. Benham has used another phrase in his article, somevAat similar to "Speak Out," which usnally conveys quite a different idea. ! He says, "Speak up." The speaker iyho tries to take this advice usually starts to shout, not to speak out. ' This is a mistake, for when he shouts, ;it is very often harder to absorb tlie \ information than before. Another book by ; a good author, that I have been studying, states that the proper: soeed for instructive delivery is from* 90 to 120 words a minute; this speed; aiid opening the mouth and teeth would.add greatly to the efficiency of iriany speakers. —I am. etc..