Toastmasters’ art

Press, 23 February 1978, Page 12

Toastmasters’ art

The Queen and her family spent Christmas at Windsor Castle. About a mile away, Bryn Williams and his' family spent Christmas at The Castle, a Windsor hotel. Bryn knows the Royal Family. He is one of the busiest toastmasters in Britain. You’ll see him on television at functions like the Lord Mayor’s Banquet standing just behind his Sovereign or the Prime Minister, recognisable with his thick, pebbly glasses, distinguished silvery hair and slim build. He was at the Castle Hotel, Windsor, hosting the four-day Christmas holiday. There were 119 guests and each paid £lOB (about $195) inclusive of everything but drinks. Bryn spends most of his time listening to speeches so he seemed ideal to ask about public speaking. The first thing, he says, is to grab your audience. “Start with impact.”

When he talks to women’s groups he begins, fortissimo: “May it please your Majesty, my lords, ladies and gentlemen. . . ” and I can believe him when he says that no one sleeps through the next half hour.

He emphasises how important it is to look at the people you’re talking to, not to air your views to the back wall or your feet. “Eye contact is vital. You must talk to each person individually.”

He likes to involve his audience. He reminisces about the many famous people he’s known. “Do you remember Winston Churchill?” he’ll ask, or “Do you recall the moon landing?” As heads

round the room nod in agreement he knows his listeners are with him.

There’s a delicate art in sensing an audience s mood and Bryn is expert at that. People who have come to be entertained have, he says, whether one likes it or not, their metaphorical arms crossed.

“They’re almost defying you. There’s an undeniable element of hostility. They’re saying ‘Go on, make me laugh’.” So he does.

Some audiences. he says. are exceedingly friendly. Some aren’t.

"With a flat audience it’s important to wait for

them. If you tell a joke, pause for them to laugh.” This is nearly impossible for a novice, but such good advice if it can be followed.

Hurrying on nervously, thinking the joke has fallen flat, silences the audience disastrously and deadens the vital two-way give and take of a good speech.

It’s all back to that magic show-business word “timing.” Gabbling, too, is a great mistake. To Bryn Williams a joke is like a springboard: one good laugh will give you audience good will for ten minutes. The best jokes, he says, are those with a double punchline. The first line gets a laugh, the second gets a

bigger, longer laugh and that, he says, will give you twenty minutes of their attention.

However, the art of telling a joke is to appear not to.

“Never say: ‘l’d like to tell you a funny story.’ If you say: ‘I must tell you a joke,” he says, “you have buried it; you have given it a memorial service, you have killed it stone dead.

“You can fill a page with ‘nevers’ underlining that. Never use the words ‘gag’, ‘story,’ or ‘joke’.”

Because he listens to so many speeches, Bryn Williams shudders at cliches. He prays, he pleads, for originality.

“Don’t start with ‘Unaccustomed as I am. . . ’ or ‘l’ve been told to stand up, speak up and shut up’ . . . ” Judging when to stop is even more crucial. “When I hear someone say ‘Finally. . .’ I know we’ve got ten minutes to go. Time after time people build up audience good will but go on and on and on. They don’t know when to stop. They dig their own graves with their mouths.

"I long to tell them “Enough!’ ‘No more!’ ‘Stop!’ Please make your wind-up paragraph short. Deliver your final line and sit on it.”