{"id":4276,"date":"2012-12-22T23:00:33","date_gmt":"2012-12-23T05:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/?p=4276"},"modified":"2012-12-22T23:01:45","modified_gmt":"2012-12-23T05:01:45","slug":"the-great-dictator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zimmerscope.com\/Verbisaurus\/2012\/12\/the-great-dictator\/","title":{"rendered":"The Great Dictator"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wednesday, 19 December 2012<\/strong>
\nMy holiday break began at approximately 12:30 this afternoon. Yes, yes, I still had to finish work today, and there are still two more days of work to go this week, but the tough stuff is all over.<\/p>\n

As I mentioned in my last post (see: Last Post<\/a>), school is done for the semester as of yesterday.\u00a0 But, as of early this afternoon, I also completed one of the toughest speeches I had to deliver in Toastmasters.<\/p>\n

After completing the Competant Communicator book back in May, I needed to select two books from the Advanced Communicator series. One of the books I chose was Interpretive Reading<\/em>. My hope was that this book would make me a better public reader (which I have done with increasing frequency lately, having had my writing published in a couple of books). But I also figured it would be an easy book to get through, since I wouldn’t have to write any speeches, I would just have to read stuff. And easy is good, since I’m often busy with homework these days.<\/p>\n

Well, it started off easy enough; I just had to read a short story. Then there was a poetry reading, which I managed well enough. Well, for speech #3 in the book, I had to recite a monologue.<\/p>\n

Okay, first: Recite<\/em>? Yikes. I can’t memorize entire monologues!<\/p>\n

And, second: Monologue<\/em>? What was I supposed to do, find a Saturday Night Live <\/em>bit I liked and memorize that? The assignment did say that I could use a stirring speech, but assignment #5 is a recitation of a speech, and I didn’t want to duplicate.<\/p>\n

Well… I ended up choosing a speech anyway. I couldn’t find any monologues I liked, so, after posting for suggestions on Facebook, one of my friends suggested Chaplin’s closing speech from his 1940 film The Great Dictator<\/em>. I actually found this movie kind of boring and overwrought, but the closing speech is among the best five minutes in the history of cinema.<\/p>\n

So, after introducing the speech – by drawing attention to Chaplin’s reluctance to move from silent film to talkie, and his desire to draw attention to the plight of citizens in Germany – I recited this:<\/p>\n