“I Wrote That”
IS.Z: Press Association) AUCKLAND, June 5. A cardinal rule of writing public speeches for prominent men should be to check your sources—or at least acknowledge them. Professor K. Sinclair, Labour candidate for Eden, told a university audience this week that while at Cambridge University he was interested to read a speech made by the Prime Minister (Mr Holyoake) when he was made a freeman of the City of London last January. “At first I found myself agreeing with much that Mr Holyoake said,” said Professor Sinclair. “Then
I thought: ‘Of course I agree with it—l wrote it’.” Passages from four parts of his Pelican history of New Zealand had been quoted, with minor verbal changes in the Prime Minister’s short speech, he said. He made no complaint about the plagiarism and he could hardly expect the Prime Minister to say, every few sentences, “according to the Labour candidate for Eden ...” but he was proud to be the Prime Minister’s new speech writer.
“If poets are the world’s unacknowledged' legislators, then historians are the unacknowledged speech writers," said Professor Sinclair.
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Bibliographic details
Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32007, 6 June 1969, Page 1
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182“I Wrote That” Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32007, 6 June 1969, Page 1
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