Student Essay on The Construction of a Great Speech

For Abraham Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address', Vaclev Havel's speech on 'the contaminated moral environment' of Czechoslovakia and Mary McAleese's address to Harvard University on 'the defence of freedom' to discuss higher ideals, their speeches must be suitably elevated, and this is achieved through deep and powerful meaning conveyed through their construction, content and language.

These speeches have each been delivered by Presidents, namely Lincoln of America, Havel of Czechoslovakia and McAleese of Ireland, and discuss in a reserved and calm tone the problems facing their respective nations or, in McAleese's case, society as a whole, and appeal for public consensus. They aim to preserve democracy, liberty and justice for all through their structure and language which was based on the time, place and situation in order to effectively explain purpose and persuade unified support for it. Such figures in high public offices will often have a sense of their nation as an audience and of been part of their nations history when they make speeches on important public occasions and this is particularly true in these speeches.

Speaking to his nation, Lincoln, like Havel who is also addressing the people of his country after the 'bloodless revolution' that his rid his nation of an oppressive communist regime, chooses to open with an inclusive device by proclaiming 'fellow countrymen', which can be linked to Havel who says 'my dear fellow citizens'. This is in difference to McAleese who was instead speaking on foreign soil and instead of seeking change in her own country wanted freedom of speech held up as an undeniable human right and as a result chose not to open inclusively but rather decree that 'human rights are the oxygen of civilisation'. The difference between McAleese's speech and the others comes as a result of the fact that what one is discussing and to whom they are speaking to will have a substantial effect on the nature of the speech delivered, because success in a speech depends on how the orator adjusts to and knows his audience and their ability to hold this audience in the palm of their hand.

Because Lincoln was speaking to a divided audience, McAleese on a controversial topic and Havel after a revolution, it was imperative that they provided common ground and unity in order to effectively persuade their audience to adopt a mutual goal and resolution. Lincoln achieves this by reflecting on the ideals and accomplishments of the forefathers they all have in common, reminding each of their unified history so that their mind frame was on the unified purpose by which their nation was conceived, rather than their present particular interests. Havel, also, is able to do this by speaking of the past glories of their nation and appealing to authority such as when he explains that they have 'polluted the soil, rivers and forests bequeathed to us by our ancestors, and we have today the most contaminated environment in Europe'. He calls on his 'fellow citizens' to awake from the metaphorical 'slumber in society enforced by the mask of apathy' maintaining throughout his speech a sense of inclusion right until his closing clarion call 'people, your government has returned to you' which is clear, shrill, arousing and inspiring for his audience. McAleese, who by not excluding anyone and stating, in reference to human rights that 'nobody owns them' and 'nobody has the authority to deny them to another' also includes everyone. Because of this larger focus, the audience is able to see the profound effect that these issues are having on society as a whole. And, in the case of Lincoln the effect that the current war was having on the entire nation and for this purpose Lincoln strategically neglected to mention slavery at all, or any other comment that would seemingly put him in favour of one side.

Lincoln's and Havel's speeches are set up in a chronological order to explain or demonstrate the steps that need to be taken to achieve what both will explain as this united goal. Having chosen a simple diction his words can be understood by all in the audience including the uneducated and language played a role in the effectives of all three speeches equally important to that of structure. By utilising inclusive words a sense of togetherness is created and the strength in the audience is found therein and thus a profound sense of both ethos and pathos resonates throughout the two speeches as they appeal to emotion and test the character of those in their audience.

Opening by discussing the past is an effective method by which Lincoln appeals to the higher ideals of his audience. He poetically explains 'Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal'. He has elucidated to his audience the fact that the nation in which they live is one which is supposed to uphold the rights of the individual and where people aren't supposed to be judged on the colour of their skin but instead the content of their character. This is similar to Havel who also first discusses events of past years, 'for forty years you heard from my predecessors on this day different variations of the same theme' regarding how their nation was 'flourishing', 'how happy they all were', how they 'trusted their government' and how 'bright perspectives were unfolding in front of them', before changing his tone dramatically and establishing the essence of his speech by rhetorically asking 'I assume you did not propose me for this office so that I, too, would lie to you'. By first looking at their past both are able to establish the good or bad situations from which their respective nations have come.

Again, this is quite different to McAleese who, because she's not speaking to her 'fellow countrymen', begins by establishing her viewpoints on 'the defence of freedom', namely that 'nobody owns' human rights, and that 'nobody has authority to deny them to another'. By using this judicial rhetoric she immediately enters a challenging and logical argument, confronting because she is speaking to an intellectual group who have undoubtedly already formed their own opinions on human rights which she may or may not be testing. Her speech is heavily factual and less emotional than the others and thus a strong sense of logos is created. She uses long discursive sentences containing hyphens and pauses which enable her to present many ideas in the one speech. But she isn't limited to judicial rhetoric otherwise her words would lack passion and impact and emotion is evident when she speaks of a 'rock hard principle'. She effectively illustrates that 'our understanding of humanity, as illustrated by the various speeches, is fluid and not concrete'.

Whereas Lincoln and Havel call to their audience through appeals relevant to their nation, we see McAleese appeal to different styles of precedent and or authority. She uses more universally relevant appeals, such as her reference to the Decleration of Human Rights which identifies with the Americans in her audience and also to the Irish when she talks about issues regarding Northern Ireland and the civil rights movement that took place there in 1969.

These speeches utilise devices effectively in order to appeal to the higher ideals of their audience. We see the use of metaphors in all of them, the metaphorical 'whip' of freedom 'on their backs' when McAleese is discussing racial issues regarding immigration, Lincoln employs a birth metaphor when he proclaims that 'our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty' and finally repeatedly in Havel's who uses a robotic or mechanical metaphor to describe the communist regime as 'the nuts and bolts of some monstrously huge, noisy and stinking machine' and also a disease metaphor when describing their current situation as a 'contaminated moral environment'. Lincoln's use of asyndeton 'we cannot dedicate - we cannot consecrate - we cannot hallow this ground' and epistrophe 'that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth' add to his speeches poetic qualities and effectiveness.

In evaluating these speeches what we've seen is the reoccurrence of the same basic calls for fundamental change in the way we treat one another. The purpose was to bring the divided people together, if only for a moment so that they might see the more important needs of society and form a singular goal of preservation and in effect, rebirth. But herein lies a problem because as is commonly stated a great speech will transcend time, but if the issues a speech addresses are still relevant for the children of future generations then the speech can't have achieved its original purpose of bringing about this change for the common good of man. Thus, it could be said that the reality is these speeches have probably not yet, and may never, have the effect that those who gave them would have hoped for. Despite their brilliance those basic flaws in the human condition that threaten to halter the upward spiral of mankind remain, and so long as they do, so will the dreams of McAleese, Lincoln and Havel.