IL DUCE’S ORATORY

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 290, 6 December 1929, Page 7

IL DUCE’S ORATORY

A LITERARY TREASURE. ITALIAN AUTHOR’S BELIEF The oratorical style of Mussolini Is carefully analysed in a book by Giuseppe Ardau, just published by Mondori, which can be strongly recommended to any one interested in following Il Duce’s evolution from a firebrand Socialist agitator in pre-war 'lays to the statesman and dictator he is to-day, says a writer in the New lork Times. The book contains an anthology of Premier Mussolini’s speeches, by which the gradual development of his fortunes can be followed step by step. That Mussolini is a great orator, possessing in superlative degree the power to move his audiences, has long been known. Signor Ardau brings out the additional fact that he possesses extraordinary powers both as a modern and classical writer. Some pages written by him, Signor Ardau predicts, will go down to history with Italian literature. Some of his writings, especially during the campaign in favour of Italy’s intervention in the World War, and some of his speeches delivered in the same period, are characterised as being as good as anything of which Italiaji literature can boast. Of pre-sent-day statesmen probably only the late Georges Clemenceau, the “Tiger” of France, can be compared to Mussolini for his literary style. Listeners Hang On Words. Few orators possess Mussolini > power to completely subjugate their audiences. Even if he speaks only a few words on some completely formal occasion his listeners hang on his lips from the moment he opens them until the moment he has finished. He can move his hearers to enthusiasm or to tears with equal ease. They become plastic material which he can §hape at will through the power merely of the spoken word. Nor is this the effect of the halo of infallibility which has surrounded him since these same qualities were most noticeable in him when he was a proor and comparatively unknown Socialist propagandist. Signor Mussolini’s method of delivering his speeches is more closely akin to the Anglo-Saxon than the Latin style of oratory. He says what he has to say in plain words, such as can be understood by any one. He uses very little gesture and none of the highsounding phrases and complicated similies in which the majority of the Italian speakers Relight. Yet such is the magnetic forio of his personality that he succeeds in conquering and convincing his audiences where old-style orators would fail. He depeds for success not on artificial trimmings in his delivery, but on the inner consciousness of his power and the intellectual superiority which he manages to transfuse into his every word.