CHAPTER VI

HOW TO SELECT YOUR MATERIAL

"The Field of the Speaker is as Vast as Life Itself." -HORNER, "The Speaker and the Audience."

THERE is no lack of material upon any subject which you wish to use. But the choice of material-that is the problem. To discard the material which is weak and ineffective and to choose that which is best fitted to attain the end you seek, requires fine discrimination and judgment. The choice of material must be governed by your purpose.

PURPOSE OR THE GENERAL ENDS OF SPEECH

For the practical needs of the average student three general ends will suffice: Feeling, Entertainment, and Action. Of course, finer distinctions can be worked out with reference to the general ends, but for the purpose of Practical Speaking, I do not wish to indulge in the multitude of fine, hair-splitting distinctions offered in many text-books. Certainly the three named: Feeling, Entertainment, Action, are the outstanding general ends of speech. Surely if you are able to stir the feelings of an audience in a heart appeal, if you can entertain them so they enjoy, if you can move them to action, then you are also able to persuade, to convince, to win belief, or to do anything you may desire. If you can make an audience laugh or cry or act, what more do you want? Clearness, of course, is a prerequisite to the attainment of any of these ends.

If called upon to make a presentation speech or to deliver a memorial address, your general end should be feeling, an appeal to sentiment or emotion. If asked to take part in an entertainment program at your lodge, or to make an after-dinner speech, your end should be entertainment-it must be enjoyable. But if you wish to influence a board of directors to do something, or wish to put through a bill before the city council, if you wish to gain votes in a political campaign, or to raise money in a drive, your end is action. With reference to the choice of material, the big thing to keep in mind is this-that the kind of material to choose is governed entirely by the end you seek. So you are not ready to select until you have determined the ultimate purpose of your talk. That is the first step. As Genung puts it, "You should seek the object before you choose the subject." The material that would be the hit of the evening at the banquet would be entirely out of place at the annual memorial, while the most touching bit of sentiment in the memorial address might not win a single vote at election time.

GATHERING MATERIAL

Having decided, then, what your general end is to be, you can now proceed to gather your material. This should be carefully done as far in advance as possible. There is a vast difference between last minute preparation and material selected in advance. Here again method is a sure means of efficiency. Notebooks and forms are great time and labor savers. Get a note-book for this purpose. Classify it under the three heads: Feeling, Entertainment, Action. Then

from day to day be on the lookout for new material. Soon you will become "polarized" for it and draw good things from every source. It may be a human interest story from a newspaper, a choice verse of poetry from a magazine, a bit of philosophy from a book, or a humorous story you hear at the club. Soon you will learn to recognize the choice things-the things that have exceptional speaking value. And when you find them, "grab them" and write them in your book under the proper classification. Don't put it off, or they will get away from you. Clip the thing you want, right now! copy it in your book today. Soon this will become a hobby with you, and you will enjoy it immensely. Gather your material day by day as you go along. Don't wait till vacation. Glean the gems and gather the nuggets and store them away for future use. In a few years such a notebook will be priceless. When you are called upon to make a speech on short notice you will have only to refer to it and find just the thing you want, ready to be utilized.

Without it you may fail to measure up to the big occasion. Every day we hear of "tragedies of the unprepared."

USE OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Illustrations are of great value in almost any kind of talk. Beecher once said, "An illustration in a speech is like a window letting in more light on the subject." You should, therefore, acquire a large stock and use them where they fit best. For example: if a speaker should be talking on the evils of inadequate transportation, and should assert that the producer

has suffered great loss thereby, he could back up his assertion by this illustration: "The farmers of the West have in many cases suffered the loss of their entire crops the past season. They have seen their grain drop in price below the cost of production, while they waited in vain for shipping facilities. They have seen their abundant fruit crop-tons of peaches and pears-rot upon the ground, because they could not get refrigerator cars to move them, and in some cases they have actually raised their potatoes, dug them and shipped them under freight rates so exorbitant that when the 'returns' came in, they suffered a net loss of fifteen to twenty cents a sack." To be most effective, this illustration should be followed up by a few concrete cases.

USE OF CONCRETE EXAMPLES

Still more important as a form of material are concrete examples or specific instances. No other form is so effective with all kinds of audiences as thisnone is so convincing-none will so quickly appeal to the heart or stir to action. Because it is concretedefinite-specific, it carries all the weight of reality. It has actuality and "factuality." Ninety-nine speakers out of a hundred would do well to use less of generalities and more of specific instances. It means 66 getting down to brass tacks" with an audience. For example, a man might talk for an hour about "the advantages of coöperation," in a general way without impressing his audience, but let him cite a specific instance-let him tell the dramatic story of the failure of President Wilson to win his points at the Peace Conference in Paris, because of his failure

to coöperate-let him give the case in detail as given by former Secretary of State, Robert Lansing, in his book, "Big Four and Others at the Peace Conference," and it will be tremendously effective in driving home his point.

To test the matter farther, make a general statement to the effect that "men often give the most valuable service to their country in their old age," and note the effect. Then follow up that statement with a concrete case-paint a word picture of Clemenceau, the Tiger of France, at the age of eighty dominating the Peace Conference and winning for his country the most favorable concessions. If your examples are well chosen, you will find your audiences following you closely-with the most intense interest. They say to themselves, "This is real-this is an actual occurrence-he is giving us something from real life now," and they believe what you say and are influenced by it to such a degree that they will act upon it. Anecdotes, inspiring examples of heroism, human interest stories-all come within this scope.

HUMAN INTEREST

The governing principle of all selection, however, is human interest value. Those things are of human interest which have been generally experienced by an audience the things they have lived, seen, heard, felt, believed, suffered and enjoyed; the things which enter into their own lives and the lives of their neighbors all about them from day to day; the things which are common to human experience and understood by all -these things have human interest value. And that