Smoothness and awkwardness
Hannon writes:
You said about Tancredo: “To me his occasional searches for the right word show sincerity and virtue.”
This is such a refreshing statement to hear (regarding anyone). I wholeheartedly concur.
Polished and highly coached delivery are no indication of brain function. Perhaps you could expound upon this idea with an essay on thoughtful awkwardness (Tancredo) vs. troubling pause in synapse function (Bush). This suggests an inverse relation to what you said earlier about appearance of public officials.
LA replies:
I’m not sure what you’re referring to in your last sentence. But I’m reminded of witnesses’ descriptions of George Washington’s first inaugural address, as related by James Thomas Flexner in Washington: The Indispensable Man (p. 217):
Various witnesses to the occasion tell us that “time had made havoc” on Washington’s face and that his aspect as he spoke was “grave almost to sadness.” As he proceeded, he moved his manuscript from his left hand to his right hand and put several fingers of his left hand into his breeches pocket. Then he extracted his right hand and made with it “an ungainly gesture.” The famous orator, Fisher Ames, was amazed by the effect of Washington’s simple delivery: “It seemed to me an allegory in which virtue was personified, and addressing those whom she would make her votaries. Her power over the heart was never greater.” The whole audience, even Vice President John Adams, who was passionately jealous of Washington, were greatly moved.
- end of initial entry -
James W. writes:
Men of great conversational powers almost universally practice a lively sophistry and exaggeration which deceives for the moment both themselves and their listeners. Yet men of gravity are often intellectual stammerers, whose thoughts move slowly. We are entitled to prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant loquacity, especially after suffering oratory that is a conspiracy between speech and action to cheat understanding.
Your obedient servants, Thomas Macaulay, Wm. Hazlitt, Marcus Cicero, and Ambrose Bierce
LA replies:
Very nice, and fits exactly with what was being said, but, if I may ask, who is the author of this? Is it you, inspired by the other four?
James W. replies:
First sentence, Macaulay, second sentence, Hazlitt. The full Cicero quote actually ends with “loquacity,” and I have attached it to the Bierce, which originally is of his “Devil’s Dictionary”: “Oratory: a conspiracy between speech and action to cheat understanding.” Also, the original Cicero is: “I prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant locquacity.”
Glad you liked it. This is what I actually do with my spare time. It’s still a work very much in progress.
LA replies:
By, “This is what I actually do with my spare time,” do you mean that you take different quotes and you arrange them together into larger quotes?
You certainly made these fit together very well. The “men of gravity” of the second sentence contrasts with the “men of conversational powers” of the first. Then the “intellectual stammerers” of the second sentence fits with the “tongue-tied knowledge” of the third.
Posted by Lawrence Auster at August 12, 2007 12:56 AM | Send