P.S. Just noticed a delayed burst of applause 36 seconds into this clip - shadow cabinet members behind him had been nodding their heads, but didn't get their hands apart to join in until after the audience in front of him has started clapping. Not a negative news story, perhaps, but is anything gained by exposing such hesitant stuff to a wider audience?
Time the Tories learnt from Mrs Thatcher's stage managers?
P.S. Just noticed a delayed burst of applause 36 seconds into this clip - shadow cabinet members behind him had been nodding their heads, but didn't get their hands apart to join in until after the audience in front of him has started clapping. Not a negative news story, perhaps, but is anything gained by exposing such hesitant stuff to a wider audience?
How to prepare a televised speech, Part (1): appearance, posture & content
Bleak news from the bush: Kenya one year later
30th anniversary of 'Yes Minister' - and a top tip for public speakers
PM apologises!
The 'snakes and ladders' theory of political communication and the power of imagery strike again
VIDEO 2: Today's Sky News report on PMQ
Did 'The Godfather' feature the longest pause and most blatant lie in the history of movies?
BAFTA award winners' speeches
You can't judge what's in Nelson Mandela's book by its cover
A weep in politics
Gordon Brown's dirty dozen (as confessed to Piers Morgan)
Why does 'The Times' think Brown's interview has 'eroded the dignity of his office'?
Gordon Brown’s interview with Piers Morgan eroded the dignity of his office
Piers Morgan interviews Gordon Brown: shades of Michael Aspel & Margaret Thatcher?
There is, after all, nothing new about embattled prime ministers taking the opportunity to appear in 'soft' talk shows.
'Meanwhile, the politicians hade their own ideas for diversifying the interview market. Bernard Ingham, Margaret Thatcher's crusty press secretary, says he wass opposed to the decision to put the prime minister on Michael Aspel's ITV chat show in 1983, but was over-ruled by her image consultants.
'But she did so well - softening the Iron Lady image assembled in the miners' strike - that even Ingham became a convert to chat show politics. Soon Mrs T was in and out of Jimmy Young's Radio Two studio as often as the Today Programme.'
For me, her appearance in Aspel & Company had at least three memorable moments:
1. Where to sit?
The first came right at the start, when Mrs Thatcher pretends that she's not sure where to sit. Yet here was someone who never went into a television studio without the advice of former TV producer Gordon Reece, who had decided that, wherever possible, her left profile should be exposed to the camera.
Also note how 'dolled up' she is - which is thoroughly consistent with a point about her 'unambiguously recognisable femininity' that I made in an earlier post on the evolution of charismatic woman.
Nelson Mandela's speech on the day he was released from prison
Having waited for years for this historic event, anticipating something on a par with Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech, I remember being disappointed and surprised by what I saw and heard from the balcony of City Hall in Cape Town. It was only later that it dawned on me that this was another case where rousing rhetoric would have been completely counter-productive.
SCRIPT OF EXCERPT IN THE VIDEO:
The sight of freedom looming on the horizon should encourage us to redouble our efforts.
It is only through disciplined mass action that our victory can be assured. We call on our white compatriots to join us in the shaping of a new South Africa. The freedom movement is a political home for you too. We call on the international community to continue the campaign to isolate the apartheid regime. To lift sanctions now would be to run the risk of aborting the process towards the complete eradication of apartheid.
Our march to freedom is irreversible. We must not allow fear to stand in our way. Universal suffrage on a common voters' roll in a united democratic and non-racial South Africa is the only way to peace and racial harmony.
In conclusion I wish to quote my own words during my trial in 1964. They are as true today as they were then. I wrote:
'I have fought against white domination and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.'
You can't judge book by its cover
- To celebrate the publication of Lend Me Your Ears in Russia on 19 February.
- To advertise my wares to British, American, Spanish and Russian audiences.
- To prove that famous quotations are sometimes literally true, as when 4 different covers = the same book within.
- To invite publishers in languages other than English, Spanish and Russian to write to me asking for a free copy to consider whether it might be worth translating.
Business Communicator of the Year 2010
The judges said: "During his tenure as President of the CBI Martin Broughton's speeches were witty, direct and controversial, making headlines and entertaining audiences. He can craft a phrase, select a great quotation and crack a good joke, which is extremely rare among top British executives and almost unheard of from a man trained as an accountant. His speeches should be studied by corporate communications departments as models of excellence."
The runners-up were Mervyn King, Governor of the Bank of England and Rory Sutherland, Vice-Chairman of Ogilvy Group UK.
Snakes, ladders & the folly of Q-A campaigning
The day when Mrs Thatcher apologised (twice) for what she said in an interview
· Do interviews ever deliver anything but bad news for politicians and boredom for audiences?
· Will the 2010 UK general election be the first one to leave us speechless?
· Two more straight answers from Mandelson - about failed coups and the PM's rages
· Mandelson gives two straight answers to two of Paxman’s questions
· Rare video clip of a politician giving 5 straight answers to 5 consecutive questions
· Politician answers a question: an exception that proves the rule
· A Tory leader's three evasive answers to the same question
· Gordon Brown's interview technique: the tip of a tedious iceberg
· A prime minister who openly refused to answer an interviewer’s questions
· Why has Gordon Brown become a regular on the Today programme?
Nobel Prize for Economics (& Atkinson Award for Imagery): Joseph Stiglitz
Unlike the economics teachers of my undergraduate days (who only inspired me to drop the subject in favour of sociology), Stiglitz has quite a way with words that I've blogged about before.
How good an economist he is, I have no idea, but this isn't the first time that I've been impressed by the ease and frequency with which he uses imagery to make his points intelligible to wider audiences.
Here are some samples from the article in today's Independent, followed by video clips of him from televised interviews over the past year or so.
Garbage disposal service
The US government, Stiglitz says, was reduced to the role of garbage disposal service for the banks' toxic assets, bad loans and worthless securities they themselves had created.
Safety net
The safety net should focus on protecting individuals; but the safety net was extended to corporations, in the belief that the consequences of not doing so would be too horrific. Once extended, it will be difficult to withdraw.
Blackmail
The world-weary response of the media and the politicians, after the immediate horrors have passed – to give in to the financial sector's blackmail.
A gun to our heads
He reminds us that the banks have effectively tried to keep "a gun to our heads", that says that if we don't keep them going on their terms then they will "kill the economy".
The market is a crazy man
"You're dealing with a crazy man, you're asking what I can do to placate a crazy man: Having got what he wants he will still kill you."
The Great American Robbery
His sheer indignation at what he calls "the Great American Robbery" – that multi-trillion dollar bailout for the banks sanctioned by the Bush and Obama administrations – is as awesome as the sums involved, and as understandable.
Calm sea of financial stability
According to Stiglitz, far from free markets delivering a calm ocean of financial stability, they have delivered us a financial crisis, on average, every year or two.
Televised debates about televised debates really would be worth watching!
'New Statesman' on political speeches & speechwriting
Translation news: Выступать легко: Все, что вам нужно знать о речах и презентациях
- The name of the originating Russian publishing house is 'Nofun Publishing', which, at least to English ears, doesn't sound too promising.
- The title of the book, according to Google's automated literal translation, is To come out easily (with the same sub-title as the English version). Even though this might take it into new and unexpected markets, I'm rather hoping that the version given to me by the books translator - Speaking in Public is Easy is nearer the mark.
- News from my brother, who speaks Russian, about the mysterious title: "vistupat is a compound verb - 'vi' (= 'outwards') + 'stupat' (= 'move') - and it can mean 'walk out' but more usually 'speak out', 'make a speech'. "
- 250 Roubles = £5.24 (i.e. about half the price it is in the UK!).
Ronald Reagan's master class on how to cope when the teleprompter lets you down
STRASBOURG, France — President Reagan, often spoken of as "the great communicator," was noticeably at a loss for words when his TelePrompTer broke down during his major speech before the European Parliament today.
White House spokesman Larry Speakes said Reagan's TelePrompTer cut out three times, causing the President to lose his place.
I don't agree with this 25 year old headline from the Los Angeles Times, as I saw it as a master class on how to recover from the worst thing that can happen when a speaker is using a teleprompter.
- Was there a hard copy of the script on the lectern?
- Was he wearing the right contact lenses to be able to read it without glasses?
400th post: Oratory and the Sound of Music
RELATED POSTS:
• Obama’s rhetoric renews UK media interest in the ‘lost art’ of oratory
• Is the media no longer interested in what goes on in parliament?
• Gordon Brown's interview technique: the tip of a tedious iceberg
• A prime minister who openly refused to answer an interviewer’s questions
• Interview techniques, politicians and how we judge them
• Politician answers a question: an exception that proves the rule
• Did the media ignore Hannan because they think speeches are bad television?