19 MAY 1950, Page 12

MARGINAL COMMENT

By HAROLD NICOLSON IWAS present last week at a lecture given by M. Andre Siegfried at the French Institute in London. I always enjoy listening to M. Siegfried, since he is so interested in what he says. Some lecturers (especially when they have just returned from a tour of the Scottish Universities) find the audiences at the Institut some- what too elderly and sedate ; they miss the flash of younger eyes ; and they tend therefore to hurry through their lectures as a perfunctory task, without for one instant allowing any zest for their subject to ' enliven the typescript from which they wearily read. M. Andre Siegfried adopts a more human method. He does not read from a prepared manuscript, but is assisted only by a few headings and notes, which he lightly disregards. He does not —as is the habit with most Continental lecturers—seat himself at the table and drone along as he turns the page: he stands up to his audience and faces them with "gaiety. And whatever subject he discusses—whether it be the aesthetic reactions of a student at Atlanta, Georgia, or the prospects of the cotton-spinning industry at ZUrich—is handled as if it were the most fascinating theme which any lecturer had ever had the privilege to examine and expound. He was talking last week about the art-of rhetoric, and he illustrated his argument by giving us an acute analysis of the different methods adopted by some of the great orators, advocates and lecturers whom he had admired in the past. I much appreciate French methods of exposition.. We in this country seek to convey to our audiences that we are, in fact, amateurs, toying with our subject as if it were some bobby which had attracted our momentary attention, and making every effort to avoid the imputation of being erudite or intellectual. The French have no such inhibitions. They are not in the least ashamed of indicating that they know more, and have thought more, about the subject of their lecture than any member of the audiences whom they address. They like to convey authority.

* * * Some people, I know, are irritated by the French habit of dividing their speeches and lectures into three or four separate categories or sections. The French begin by stating what is the nature of the subject which they intend to discuss ; they then divide their theme under certain precise headings, which they deal with one by one ; they then introduce illustrations and examples to prove their thesis ; and they conclude by a summary of their argument and often with a fine finale or peroration. French lecturers do not pretend, as British lecturers often pretend, that their ideas have occurred to them casually ; they have none of the carefully calculated spontaneity, the heavily laboured improvisa- tions, in which our orators indulge ; they make it perfectly clear that they have prepared their lecture with forethought, that they have planned it architecturally so that it shall constitute an inte- grated whole, and that they have sketched out in advance how they will begin, how they will continue and how they will end. I admit that this punctilious method may, in the hands of an inexpert or stupid orator, become so mechanical as to suggest an undergraduate thesis and thereby gather the clouds of boredom in the room. But in the hands of an artist these rhythmic divisions, this sense of purpose and intention, do provide the audience with an agreeable feeling that, within these rigid architectural lines, much interesting variation can be expected. The pleasure of expectation is enlivened by the pleasure of surprise. I enjoy a sense of design.

* * *

M. Andre Siegfried, in his discourse on rhetoric, divided the purpose of oratory under three main headings. A speaker seeks either to move, to persuade, or to teach. He indicated that for each of these three purposes a different technique is required. An orator who seeks to move his audience must possess an impressive person- ality, a vibrant voice and great sincerity of conviction. An orator who seeks to -persuade his audience must approach his subject as a great general approaches a strategic or tactical problem. He must present, the truth from a certain definite point of view,•must muster his stronger arguments in the centre of the line of battle, and must seek by ruse and stratagem to conceal, or at least to divert attention from,, those elements in his argument which he knows to be weak. The teacher, in the third place, should concentrate uniquely upon conveying what he regards as the exact truth ; he must establish his authority over the audience, must leave no zones of uncertainty, must be lucid, precise and convincing. Whereas the teacher has only to consider whether he is conveying to his audience that they are learning something of great truth and significance, the orator who seeks to move or to persuade must approach his listeners in a more tactful, tentative manner. He must either wheedle or startle. M. Siegfried illustrated this contention by contrasting the methods of Aristide Briand and Clemenceau. The former, during the first ten minutes of a speech, would obviously be weighing his audience, estimating the moods and attitudes of those who would agree and those who would not agree, and would therefore, during this over- ture, be deliberately " vaseux," or woolly, biding his time. Clemenceau, on the other hand, adopted shock tactics from the outset ; he was an " Attila among orators " ; his aim was not to conciliate but to startle and alarm.

Other speakers, other orators, impressed themselves upon their audiences by different methods. Waldeck-Rousseau bemused his hearers by the excellence of his artistic arrangement, so that they ceased to notice what was true and what false. Poincare imposed himself upon them by the rigour of his logic, by his phenomenal memory, by the intensity of his convictions. Ferdinand Brunetiere was the old-fashioned type of lecturer ; he would seat himself at the table, drop a piece of sugar into his glass of water, stir it slowly with a tea-spoon and then start reading his lecture, turning the pages one by one with his little finger elegantly twirled. Bergson imposed an almost religious silence, indulged in long and agonising pauses, and would gaze upwards at the gallery as if searching for the little light of truth. Are there any general rules, M. Siegfried asked, which one can deduce from this variance of method ? Certainly, he concluded, there are certain rules. The main purpose of any speaker is to command attention ; he must be heard. Acoustics, he contended, represent some 60 per cent. of the whole problem. But the speaker must also be alive, he must not show that he is bored by his own subject, and he must watch the eyes of his audience in order to see when they become dimmed by inattention. When speaking to French audiences he must aim at speed ; only a Bergson can afford pauses and intermissions ; when speaking to English audiences a certain hesitation in delivery, even a slight stammer, has much to recommend it. It was a mistake, M. Siegfried suggested, to use the words " in conclusion " unless, in fact, one is about to conclude_ And finally the orator must be quite certain in his own mind how he intends to close his speech, whether by a set peroration or by a sudden and often most effective snap.

These are excellent rules. They are the same as were given by his tutor to Alexander the Great at a time when that emphatic young man was busy in Bactria and can have reeked but little of " the study of reasoned speech." What to him, as he leapt from the wall at Malli, can have meant the devices which his tutor recom- mended ; the probabilities, examples, tokens, maxims, signs, and postulates which he was urged to practise and adopt ? What need had Alexander of a paradigm ? What need had he, as he swept in conquest from Gaugamela to the Hyphasis, to worry his triumphant head about enthymemes ? But to us epigones who lack the phalanxes it is very important, if we are parliamentary candidates or aspirants, to avoid enthymemes. Most important indeed.