Friday, testimony in the British House of Parliament, of Tony Blair, who was Prime Minister for, I think, about ten years, about how and why he decided, about war.
He is a wonderful communicator, and listening, but even more looking at him, through hours, as he answered questions and told what he wanted to tell, even if he was not asked about it, get his point accross, was a great lesson for me.
"Direct" on TV, instead of just the few scenes that the journalists from Television choose, that is a great difference. I am happy to have now a television on which I could listen to the Parliament's speeches, usually a lot less good. But comparing is also great lesson.
Not reading, and only from time to time glimpsing to his notes, very confident, great smile and eye contact. Some very appropriate hand gestures but not too many. Yes, I understood why they wrote that Tony Blair is a great communicator.
He did mostly convey why he did decide thus, putting it in a greater, international, historical, context.
The same day, I looked through the web, on YouTube, at the State of Union Speech of Barack Obama, in the US parliament, one and half hour speech. And it did not seem too long! He is also an excellent communicator. He conveyed the difficulties, and also the confidence: he will deal with them, and not only for tomorrow's challenges but also for those who come after us. Besides learning a lot from his speech, and what he said, I also observed his smile, his pauses, his head and hand movements.
Weather on Television or the Internet, we have lots of possibilities to listen to great speeches.
I found there also speeches of great orators of the past, at least those who were filmed, from the last century, as well as texts of old speeches from far away centuries.
No comments:
Post a Comment