Great orators
 

I admire great orators because everyone has the opportunity to practice on speaking well but most fall short. I just watched MLK's "I Have A Dream " speech and am in awe of his delivery and presence; I even got goosebumps. I can't imagine [and feel quite jealous] of what an African-American person feels listening to the speech.

There is also something about Ronald Reagan's voice; it makes me want to listen to his speeches despite not caring what he has to say.

Does anyone else have a clip or description of a speech they enjoy?

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Josiah Bartlet was pretty good.

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There was a recent thread in TLDR that linked to American Rhetoric's Top 100 Speeches list.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOPuUlpp238

This is a very famous speech from 1964 at Berkeley that took place before a Free Speech sit-in. I first came across this speech at UCLA during an agitational communications class with Professor Von Blum.

Also, The Ballot or the Bullet is an amazing speech and well worth taking the time to listen to.

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Oratory Skills: Hitler

Voice/Narration: Morgan Freeman, and it's not close

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Josiah Bartlet was pretty good.

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heh knew exactly what clip that would be without clicking it. good speech, nice example of a little thing i like to call cadence.

clinton was really good imo

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Kofi Annan.

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I've always liked Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I a Woman?".

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Bill Clinton is the best I've ever seen.

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I'm not aware of any specific speech and he was far before our time, but Henry Clay's nickname was "The Great Orator".

From his wiki:

"In public he was of magnificent bearing, possessing the true oratorical temperament, the nervous exaltation that makes the orator feel and appear a superior being, transfusing his thought, passion and will into the mind and heart of the listener; but his imagination frequently ran away with his understanding, while his imperious temper and ardent combativeness hurried him and his party into disadvantageous positions. The ease, also, with which he outshone men of vastly greater learning lured him from the task of intense and arduous study. His speeches were characterized by skill of statement, ingenious grouping of facts, fervent diction, and ardent patriotism; sometimes by biting sarcasm, but also by superficial research, half-knowledge and an unwillingness to reason a proposition to its logical results."

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XX2Qk...ed&search=

never seen this before, clinton speech he gave at harvard. i enjoyed it

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I heard Jesse Jackson speak in the 80s when he was running for president. It was in New Orleans. I had tagged along with my mom to a conference. It was really quite amazing how he worked the crowd up. People were sitting on the edge of their seats and he had people calling out and raising their hands in the crowd. I don't remember what he said, but I remember the feeling he gave--like anything was possible. Also, I remember how just when he had worked people up and gotten them euphoric; people came along with baskets exactly like those you would pass out at church. He was asking for donations to his campaign. I remember thinking he was a great orator and also very sly. I think he could have talked that group into just about anything. People were fumbling all over the place for their wallets.

I've heard Maya Angelou speak in person twice. The first time she was electric. It was around the time she was selected by Bill Clinton to recite at his inauguration. The house was packed, standing room only. She left everyone awed. The second time was more recently. She was also impressive, but the venue was larger and more impersonal.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XX2Qk...ed&search=

never seen this before, clinton speech he gave at harvard. i enjoyed it

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Clinton is inscrutable to me. I used to love him; I remember seeing him on tv in '91 as a kid and instantly feeling drawn to his charisma. But lately I'm always troubled while watching him, because I cannot tell how much is serious or not, whether he really believes anything he says. And if not, if he's insincere, what level he's on. Behind the oratory, he could be Frank Abagnale or he could be David Brent; I just can't tell. And yet I still want to like him, because that's his skill (and that's what this thread is about).

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I'm a fan of Eisenhower's speech. Here he discusses the three imperatives of peace, but many of his speeches are excellent. Such a speaker that it makes me want to move to the US and become a Republican.

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While not an orator per se, William F Buckley is an engaging speaker/debater, not necessarily for his content but because of his style. I am amazed at his command of the English language, find his weird accent and speaking pace interesting and sometimes unnerving, yet I often [censored] lose track of what the [censored] he's talking about... I don't think I'm smart enough to hold a conversation with him... about anything.

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how has churchill not been mentioned yet? yeti, aren't you from england? tsk tsk. a couple of my favorites are "we shall fight on the beaches" and "their finest hour"; really stirring stuff.

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Lou Gehrig's "Luckiest man on the face of the earth" speech when he retired at Yankee Stadium. The man was basically handed a death sentence and he handled the situation with amazing grace and dignity.

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cicero

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adolf

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patrick henry

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Lincoln.

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I guess nobody remembers that Frederick Douglass had crowds in Ireland doing the wave.

-Michael

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Malcom X was excellent, particularly right before he was assassinated when his views were a lot more moderate.

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Liev Schrieber is phenomenal narrating HBO sports documentaries (Curse of the Bambino, Barbaro, Miracle on Ice)

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Farrakhan & Hitler

odd isn't it?

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Jesus, Charles H. Spurgeon, Billy Graham, Martin Luther King Jr.

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Jesus,

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What makes you think he was a good orator?




In Australian public life, there are very few great speeches in the US sense - person standing up at a podium (or whever) and delivering an address. I think it's a feature of our political system which features a lot more questions and responses rather than monologues.

So, in that sense, if you're interested in someone who is truly great at the cut and thrust of interviews/questions/etc., current Australian PM John Howard is exceptionally good at that. Much of the material is available online at www.pm.gov.au. Of course, it's not stuff you could listen to in the same sense as a MLK or Reagan speech, but on a technical level, he is simply very good at it.

He has made it into a key part of his political campaigning, and what seems like every day takes live-to-air, public, radio talkback callers as part of his regular schedule. I think it is pretty special to have a national leader so incredibly accessible to the public.

In his role as PM, I think he has only given one totally scripted speech - an ANZAC Day address in Turkey a few years ago. The guy refuses to use teleprompters and other devices like that, and although he'll sometimes have notes, he never reads scripts.

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i decided to actually look up churchill's "their finest hour" speech and paste an excerpt here, but first, a little context for the speech, which was delivered on june 18 1940.

on sept 1 1939, germany invaded poland, prompting france and britain finally to declare war on germany. a mere nine months later, germany had conquered denmark, norway, belgium, and holland. on june 14 1940, the nazis marched into paris. czechoslovakia and poland were already under nazi control, italy was an axis power ruled by mussolini, and spain was a military dictatorship under franco. essentially all of europe was under fascist rule...except britain.

britain was utterly alone, facing the invincible military might of nazi germany. the united states? we wouldn't enter the war for another year-and-a-half, an eternity the way hitler was conquering nations. (besides, no one could know when, if ever, we would join the war.)

so that was the impossibly bleak situation britain was in when churchill, having become prime minister only a month ago, gave his speech which ended with these words:


What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization. Upon it depends our own British life, and the long continuity of our institutions and our Empire. The whole fury and might of the enemy must very soon be turned on us.

Hitler knows that he will have to break us in this Island or lose the war. If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free and the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands. But if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science.

Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that, if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, 'This was their finest hour.'


full speech here.

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This is a commencement address that Steve Jobs gave to the class of 2005 at Stanford.

Steve Jobs

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cicero

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The fact that the brilliance of the best orators of antiquity is completely unknown to most people of modern times astounds me.

That said, if you can consider Plato's accounts to be accurate, Socrates has to rate very highly. The fact that his opening in The Apology, "What you have heard about me from my accusers, Athenians, I do not know," utilizes a common rhetorical trick still used today is a testament to that.

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cicero

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The fact that the brilliance of the best orators of antiquity is completely unknown to most people of modern times astounds me.

That said, if you can consider Plato's accounts to be accurate, Socrates has to rate very highly. The fact that his opening in The Apology, "What you have heard about me from my accusers, Athenians, I do not know," utilizes a common rhetorical trick still used today is a testament to that.

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What trick is that?

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The Steve Jobs commencement address was very good.

Anyone have other links to famous commencement address speeches?

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cicero was badass. the wiki doesnt do him justice. mebbe ill look up some good sites for him someday. some things from memory:

cicero was not of the noble class, yet he still rose to the most powerful political rank in rome of the time of the republic, consul.

he stood up and saved the republic from powerful conspirators. his orations against cataline are what made him famous. look up cataline etc.

he was so well liked that despite supporting pompey, caesar forgave him and accepted him back to rome. this was a huge gesture considering caesar killed nearly all of his even marginal opponents.

its somewhat surprising that cicero is not more studied in american education considering that his political thoughts are quite in line with democracy and he devoted his life to defending the roman republic.

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he was so well liked that despite supporting pompey, caesar forgave him and accepted him back to rome. this was a huge gesture considering caesar killed nearly all of his even marginal opponents.


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Cicero was special because he really believed in the republic. He was the very definition of a patriot.

However, your comment about Caesar is the exact opposite of the truth. Caesar was extremely generous to his defeated opponents. He had to be, or else his scheme of becoming the supreme ruler of Rome without actually looking like a monarch would fail. He was essentially ruthless towards those who stood against him, but pardoned nearly *everyone* who layed down arms. Cicero was not special in that regard. Killing Cicero off would've been a horrible political move, so it wasn't exactly done out of kindness.

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Demosthenes of Athens was probably the greatest orator from ancient Greece (though it could be Pericles, maybe Socrates depending on your definition of orator).

Many/most of his great speeches are extant and thus, readable.

He was so good that Cicero called him "the perfect orator." Other greats had similar lofty compliments to offer.

He is known for speaking out against the machinations of Phillip II (father of Alexander the Great), who wanted to be master of all Greece. He was able to sway many Greek cities (including Thebes, the pre-eminent military power in non-Macedonian Greece at the time) to the Athenian cause. This effort was doomed to failure, but considering how powerful Macedonia was at the time, gaining the support he did was an incredible feat.

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I agree with Winston Churchill. I don't think there can be any orator or indeed, leader, before or since like him. Also worth mentioning is Daniel O'Connell, who campaigned for Catholic emancipation in Ireland in the 19th century, His meetings used to attract 100,000 people. I've heard it said that they could all hear him, so loud was his voice. Consider that they didn't have loudspeakers then and that's quite a fine effort.