Emphasis can be increased in proportion to the extension or enlargement of the elements of conversational form. The inflections and changes of pitch are lengthened, the pauses are extended, the rhythmic movement is more varied according to the degree of earnestness or emphasis. The emphatic words are made more prominent, and those not emphatic are made more subordinate, normally by greater range of voice. It is important to study and to practice degrees of emphasis, because it is the endeavor to increase the degree of emphasis that causes a great many faults in delivery. There is often a tendency to submerge all the elements of form in mere loudness; to throw all the energy into some abnormal push or swell, and to eliminate change of pitch, inflection, and range; this tendency is the cause of rant and stilted delivery, and develops the declamatory and unnatural methods so common among speakers. A young speaker who aims to correct these defects or to avoid the formation of obnoxious mannerisms should read some of the simple, dignified passages which have been illustrated, with conversational ease and repose, and then give them so they can be heard by a thousand people, being careful to increase emphasis by simply extending the range, length of inflection, changes of pitch, and pauses. The contrasts which have already been mentioned between the simplest and plainest conversation and the largest and most emphatic extension of the elements of vocal form, preserving naturalness in both cases, constitute also an important exercise for practice. Of course, with increase of emphasis there is increase of intensity. Intensity is manifested by means of simple decisive-` ness of touch, inflections, and changes of pitch, or by extending the pauses and the range of voice. Dignity and intensity in emThey are preserved in direct proportion as the increase in degrees of emphasis is obtained by extending range, and not by increase of loudness. phasis are destroyed by loudness. In order to prevent declamatory stiltedness and to develop sensitiveness to the nobleness and dignity of naturalness and simplicity, it is a good practice to give the speech of a king, prince, or other exalted personage without lowering his dignity or losing the character, or acting in any way inconsistent with its spirit. Though the royal speech be excited or earnest, it should be in harmony with his dignity and bearing. Problem LXXIII. Read a most emphatic passage with its true spirit of earnestness and energy, but by increasing the touch and extending the range, without increasing the volume of tone above the ordinary conversational degree of loudness. 293 BUT, my lords, who is the man that, in addition to the disgrace and mischiefs of the war, has dared to authorize and associate to our arms the tomahawk and scalping-knife of the savage?—to call into civilized alliance the wild and inhuman inhabitants of the woods? — to delegate to the merciless Indian the defence of disputed rights, and to wage the horrors of his barbarous war against our brethren? My lords, these enormities cry aloud for redress and punishment. Pitt. 294 WE are in God's hand, brother, not in theirs; march to the bridge. 295 ONCE to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side. Lowell. Problem LXXIV. Read a series of extracts, giving the first as if to only one friend, and increase or vary the audience and the earnestness, till at last a passage can be given to a vast audience of the representatives of a great nation upon an important issue. 296 EXCELLENCE, in human art as in human character, has from the beginning of things been even more uniform than Mediocrity, by virtue of the closeness of its approach to Nature. 297 A DEWDROP, falling on the wild sea-wave, Which thrust it forth, as it had feared, to die; Palgrave. Until again, "I perish quite!" it said, Torn by rude diver from its ocean bed. Oh, unbelieving! So it came to gleam Chief jewel in a monarch's diadem. "Life Through Death." Richard Chenevix Trench. 298 WE sit as in a boundless Phantasmagoria and Dream-grotto; boundless, for the faintest star, the remotest century, lies not even nearer the verge thereof: sounds and many-coloured visions flit round our sense; but Him, the Unslumbering, whose work both Dream and Dreamer are, we see not; except in rare half-waking moments, suspect not. Creation, says one, lies before us, like a glorious Rainbow; but the Sun that made it lies behind us, hidden from us. Then, in that strange Dream, how we clutch at shadows as if they were substances; and sleep deepest while fancying ourselves most awake! 299. THE CONVENTION OF FRANCE, 1789. Carlyle. I HEAR much said of patriotism, appeals to patriotism, transports of patriotism. Gentlemen, why prostitute this noble word? Is it so very magnanimous to give up a part of your income in order to save your whole property? This is very simple arithmetic; and he that hesitates, deserves contempt rather than indignation. Yes, gentlemen, it is to your immediate self-interest, to your most familiar notions of prudence and policy, that I now appeal. I say not to you now, as heretofore, beware how you give the world the first example of an assembled nation untrue to the public faith. I ask you not, as heretofore, what right you have to freedom, or what means of maintaining it, if, at your first step in administration, you outdo in baseness all the old and corrupt governments. I tell you, that unless you prevent this catastrophe, you will all be involved in the general ruin; and that you are yourselves the persons most deeply interested in making the sacrifices which the government demands of you. I exhort you, then, most earnestly, to vote these extraordinary supplies; and God grant they may prove sufficient! Vote them, I beseech you; for, even if you doubt the expediency of the means, you know perfectly well that the supplies are necessary, and that you are incapable of raising them in any other way. Vote them at once, for the crisis does not admit of delay; and, if it occurs, we must be responsible for the consequences. While you Beware of asking for time. Misfortune accords it never. are lingering, the evil day will come upon you. Why, gentlemen, it is but a few days since, that upon occasion of some foolish bustle in the Palais Royal, some ridiculous insurrection that existed nowhere but in the heads of a few weak or designing individuals, we were told with emphasis, "Catiline is at the gates of Rome, and yet we deliberate." We know, gentlemen, that this was all imagination. We are far from being at Rome; nor is there any Catiline at the gates of Paris. But now are we threatened with a real danger: bankruptcy, national bankruptcy, is before you; it threatens to swallow up your persons, your property, your honor, - and yet you deliberate. Mirabeau. THE XXXVII. FAULTS OF EMPHASIS. HE chief faults of emphasis are a lack of decision of touch, a lack of directness or straightness of inflection, the substitution of force for form, a lack of range of voice, a constant use of some one mode, no definite centres of attention and the elimination of all emphasis, or the making of too many words emphatic. It is impossible in writing to explain these, or even to enumerate a tenth of the common faults among speakers. The detection of specific faults must be the work of a teacher. One specific fault may be illustrated: a drop of the voice upon the emphatic word instead of a salient falling inflection from a higher pitch. There is a rising of the voice towards the emphatic word, but when that is reached, the voice drops upon the word, and the interval is not an upward interval before the emphatic falling inflection, but a downward one in the same direction as the inflection. This fault is the chief element in what is called 'ministerial' melody. It gives the impression of a kind of passive sadness. It is caused by a lack of saliency, absence of control, or a vague ecstatic condition of the mind. In the development of emphasis it is better to be positive rather than negative. The general steps and methods here arranged will tend to prevent as well as to eliminate all faults. In the correction of mannerisms, there must be a definite diag nosis by the teacher and a special application of principles so as to eradicate causes of faults. The chief causes of faults are found in a lack of definite thinking, a failure to relate ideas to each other, a lack of methodic insight, a failure to concentrate and hold the mind upon a single idea and to subordinate others, the absence of progression toward an idea held in the mind during the sequence of sentences or paragraphs, lack of control over emotion, and inflexibility of the voice. No amount of technical work, no amount of diagnosis as to the nature of any fault or acquisition of some right mechanical action will correct faults without the removal of the cause. Unless the cause is removed, the fault will return, even though the man may see it and may consciously avoid it for a time. The true secret of naturalness in emphasis is to give each idea specific value in relation to the thought. The student must be true to the process of his mind; he must mean what he says and say what he means, and make each step manifest. Faults often arise from a wholesaling of ideas instead of giving each central idea individual force or in detail. The student must think one idea at a time, and so present it that another mind cannot fail to receive it; he should be simple, sincere and direct in his mental attitude toward each idea and specific in the presentation of it to his auditor. The mind must be trained to carry what has been given, what is familiar, and to penetrate to the 'additional point,' or to select the right word; and to introduce to the audience the one idea in each clause, and to give the right degree of accentuation that will cause progress towards a purpose. One of the simplest and most effective methods of correcting defects of emphasis, is to assign dialogues from standard dramas. By this means a student is led to study the action of the mind and its effect upon the voice. Scenes may be chosen with more or less of animation, and with varying degrees of dignity and intensity, to suit each individual need. The student should listen to his interlocutor and relate every word and idea to him. |