By Fraser P. Seitel
Hey kids, what time is it?
Commencement time, when eager PR graduates are treated to generally turgid, meaningless, and instantly-forgotten prose from graduation speakers trying too hard to be profound.
Rudolf Flesch, the legendary Austrian readability expert used to counsel to “write like you speak.” This is especially important in writing a speech, particularly a commencement speech, when you’re addressing in-a-hurry, let’s get on with it, graduates and their parents.
So here, with thanks to Yvonne Lewis Day, Louisiana communication consultant, is a glossary of “speech deadwood” that should be avoided if you are called on to write or deliver a speech on commencement day.
The best speeches exhibit “courage;” they’re unafraid to be daring or stick the speaker’s neck out. Prefacing statements with timid platitudes sets a speaker up for failure. “As a matter of fact,” Mark Twain once said, “precedes many a statement that isn’t.”
So avoid such platitudes which subtract from the meaning of your remarks by adding unnecessary verbiage, such as:
- I might add
- It is interesting to note
- It should be remembered
- It is worthy to say
- May I say
- Permit me to say
- With your kind permission
Or worst of all, “to be honest,” which implies that you haven’t been up to now!
Avoid telling the listener in advance that something is interesting or noteworthy or funny. Much of the time, it won’t be.
Speech deadwood also includes vague modifying words that add nothing to the points you’re trying to make. These, ordinarily, are words added to make the speaker sound “smart.” They don’t. For example:
- Appreciably
- Comparatively
- Considerably
- Definitely
- Fairly
- Nearly
- Somewhat
- Suitable
- Undue
- Various
The problem with such words is they leave the listener hanging, without knowing what to think. Is an “appreciable” increase in taxes acceptable, onerous or irrelevant? One doesn’t know from the use of the word.
The better way to do it: Tell listeners precisely, specifically, pointedly what you mean. If you’re not sure, tell ‘em that.
Look up the word “gasbag” in the dictionary, and you’ll find picture of Democrat Senator Carl Levin and Republican Senator Richard Shelby, two of the most insufferable blowhards in an insufferably blowhardish body. Levin and Shelby are masters of using laborious phrases where simple ones would do. Such pretentious phrases are a drag on energy and momentum, as are the senators a drag on progress and positivism.
Here’s what you’ll frequently hear them say and what you should studiously avoid in your writing:
- At this point in time
- At the present time
- At the time in question
- Insofar
- Inasmuch
- Whereas
- In point of fact
The real point is that a speaker – and the writer who drafts the speaker’s words – ought to be direct, straightforward and to-the-point in every sentence, every phrase, every paragraph that he or she utters.
When in doubt, use as your model the pithy memo that the late Charles Colson wrote to White House Counsel John Dean, when the former was confronted by Watergate conspirator Howard Hunt demanding more hush money. Wrote Colson:
“Now what the hell do I do?” |