“DEPLORABLY LOW”

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17062, 21 September 1929, Page 4

“DEPLORABLY LOW”

STANDARD OF SPEECH A JUDGE’S OPINION “The standard of public speaking in New Zealand at present is deplorably low. Of the making of speeches there seems no end. Public speech in this Dominion may be rich in quantity but it is certainly poor in quality. Until at least one or our more talkative bores is—justifiably—shot on the public platform, I fear, however, that there is not much hope of improvement in this respect !” The above observations were made by His Honor Mr. Justice’MacGregor in an address on “The Art of Public Speaking” to a meeting at Wadestown, Wellington, of the Men’s Society of St. Luke’s Church.

“For more than one reason it appears to me to lie of importance that, the art of speaking in public should lie. carefully cultivated at the present time,” said His Honor. “The advent of wireless has vastly extended the range and influence of the human voice. ~ Before the days of broadcasting, an orator could address at most a few thousand people Now his hearers may be numbered in millions. Broadcasting may become indeed a great influence for good or evil in the community. Curiously enough, too, many an indifferent, speaking voice sounds well on tlie wireless, and Hie microphone appears to have a capricious influence in this respect, which may perchance transform a poor speaker into an efficient broadcaster. It is all the more important, therefore, that the thoughts and ideas thus transmitted to .tfie multitude should be good in them%(*lves aiul should also be couched in pure and scholarly English, not disfigured by faults in style or pronunciation. \\e have already in this Dominion too much slovenly language, too much slang and too much twang. The public speaker of the future could do a great deal to correct these faults, to teach the rising generation to’think clearly, to enunciate, properly and to speak correctly. “FOR, WEAL Oil WOE”

“That recent phenomenon, commonly known as the talkies, must also inevitably produce some effect on our public speech for weal or woe,” he continued. “It is too early as yet to foretell with confidence what the- final result may be, whether in the end it may do good or harm. If the mechanical process becomes perfected and the actors speak clearly and correctly in good English it may be that the talkies will tend to improve and not to injure the public speakers of the future. Bid if the ears of our young people are to be persistently assailed by nasal and raucous voices booming forth second-rate American slang, I fear that the public and' private speech of the rising generation must be corrupted in the process.” Public speaking was at its best one of the fine arts and not merely a mechanical process of stringing words together. Pascal was near the_ truth when lie said, “Eloquence is a pictorial representation of thought.” That should be the true conception underlying the effort of every orator, whether lie desired to instruct or to persuade his audience. He should endeavor to place before the mental eyes of his hearers a true and convincing picture of tile thoughts he wished to convey to them. Muddled thinking in the mind of the speaker made lucid speech on his part all but impossible. A RARE .BIRD A speech should be to an essay what a black and white sketch was to a finished’ picture. It should be bold, striking and clearly cut, rather thftn over-refined and studied, in its wordpainting. The purest and most elevated type of oratory was undoubtedly the genuine impromptu or extempore speech, but that was a rare bird jndeed. His Honor said true orators were at least as rare as true poets. It had 'been his lot for nearly half a century to listen to numberless speeches in public, but during that time he had heard only two real orators—Gladstone and Rosefiery. He did not expect ever to hear eloquence like’ theirs again. Tersely and crudely put. the rules of the game were frequently enunciated as, “Stand up, speak up, nnd shut up!”