Orators of my life..

I first heard about this word when I was in 10^th. My vocabulary was not that great! I remember the lesson on Julius Caesar. It was in the book called the MCB (Main course book) English. The style of Shakespeare’s writings was something never seen before, the use of words, the poetry in his writings and the general syntax. As our English teacher (I was very lucky to have a wonderful teacher!) explained the lesson sentence by sentence, we jotted down the meaning in our respective books in teeny meeny handwriting! (When I and my family were clearing our house after Dad’s transfer to Orissa, I found this book, dirty but intact. I had a nice time flipping through its pages and laughing at how meticulously I used to write down each line and make a maze of arrows from here and there due to lack of space!) The praise for Anthony for his speech rings in my ears till now. When I completely understood that, that speech has stayed in my mind till now, “ For Brutus is honorable,..” The immaculate use of sarcasm, satire to convince and then gain the support of the Romans was like ‘out of the world’ for me! His ‘oratorical’ skills were superlative.  <<Satire, Sarcasm>>

Then came the time when I saw Barrack Obama give his inaugural speech. His panache, delivery was alluring! While watching the speech, I was not listening to is words but his body language and confidence was all I saw.  “Change, we can,” bellowed the American Crowd. <<Confidence, Delivery>>

Then I came across a movie that highlighted the importance of argument in daily life, reasoning and, most importantly for learning. The movie went by the name, ‘Thank you for smoking’. This guy was the spokesperson for an institute which researched into the effects of smoking. Their job was to prove that ‘Smoking and lung cancer cannot be correlated’. This single institute was the backbone for all cigarette manufacturers namely Marlboro, Wills etc in defending themselves against health authorities, ethical fans and the pope! Will all the odds, evidence and literally the whole world against him, he had the intelligence and presence of mind to steer himself thorough debates and talk shows. The power of argument! There is a dialogue from the movie when the guy is explaining his son about argument that,” It is not important to be correct in an argument but to be better than the other person.” That thing struck me, real hard. <<Argument, confidence>>

During college, we had a professor in Physiology. He taught us ‘Special senses’. Intellectually he was one of the best professors I have met. His personality was infectious! Whether it was his expedition to Antarctica or his ‘rocking days’ at college that he talked about, I heard all of it in rapt attention. One quality was responsible for it, Humor. It was not sleazy, not demeaning often sarcastic, very creative and mostly meaningful. More than the lectures, I just loved listening to him in general. <<Humor>>

As I initiated my days of PG coaching at DBMI, Karol Bagh, I was really unhappy as my weekends were going to be non-existent after that. But the first day, I was welcomed to my class by an obstetrician/ Gynecologist, product of JIPMER, Pondicherry. My initial low mood was erased as I listened to his amazing medical jokes and extremely hilarious actions that he used to depict certain things or scenes. It makes me laugh as I write this as some of those scenes dance in front of my eyes! Again, his humor was brilliant! Some things about their humor (this teacher and my professor) is that their jokes are authentic and not practiced like the ones many teachers use over their teaching career with different batches of students. <<Actions>>

I have had many friends over these years, but I have spent maximum time with hostel mates for obvious reasons. As we came into the semester when the students’ union elections are held, I discovered, learnt and was left in awe sometimes, by the convincing power of some of my friends. The ability to make someone think, perceive like you do! It could be called manipulation, but that is an art too. <<convince>>

My father is a great speaker too, because he speaks from his heart, very true and unafraid of the consequences. It has many a times led to arguments with mom, but that is how he is. He is very emotional and thus gains the support of the people around him not by melodrama but by being very attached and holding the topic close to his heart. <<Truth, Emotion>> 

The greatest myth I have known is fluency. It is not about being fluent, but about conveying the point with the least degree of complication and without excessive flamboyance; in a way that is easily understood and appreciated. The art of speaking is too subjective and diverse to be abridged into a sentence.

Interpretation left to the ‘eye’ of the listener!