CHAPTER V
CONCLUDING THE SPEECH
Preparing the Conclusion. No architect would attempt to plan a building unless he knew the purpose for which it was to be used. No writer of a story would start to put down words until he knew exactly how his story was to end. He must plan to bring about a certain conclusion. The hero and heroine must be united in marriage. The scheming villain must be brought to justice. Or if he scorn the usual ending of the "lived happily ever after" kind of fiction, he can plan to kill his hero and heroine, or both; or he can decide for once that his story shall be more like real life than is usually the case, and have wickedness triumph over virtue. Whatever he elects to do at the conclusion of his story, whether it be long or short, the principle of his planning is the same—he must know what he is going to do and adequately prepare for it during the course of, previous events.
One other thing every writer must secure. The ending of a book must be the most interesting part of it. It must rise highest in interest. It must be surest of appeal. Otherwise the author runs the risk of not having people read his book through to its conclusion, and as every book is written in the hope and expectation that it will be read through, a book which fails to hold the attention of its readers defeats its own purpose.
The foregoing statements are self-evident but they are set down because their underlying principles can be transferred to a consideration of the preparation of conclusions for speeches.
Is a Conclusion Necessary? But before we use them let us ask whether all speeches require conclusions.
There are some people—thoughtless, if nothing worse—who habitually end letters by adding some such expression as "Having nothing more to say, I shall now close." Is there any sense in writing such a sentence? If the letter comes only so far and the signature follows, do not those items indicate that the writer has nothing more to say and is actually closing? Why then, when a speaker has said all he has to say, should he not simply stop and sit down? Will that not indicate quite clearly that he has finished his speech? What effect would such an ending have?
In the first place the speaker runs the risk of appearing at least discourteous, if not actually rude, to his audience. To fling his material at them, then to leave it so, would impress men and women much as the brusque exit from a group of people in a room would or the slamming of a door of an office.
In the second place the speaker runs the graver risk of not making clear and emphatic the purpose of his speech. He may have been quite plain and effective during the course of his explanation or argument but an audience hears a speech only once. Can he trust to their recollection of what he has tried to impress upon them? Will they carry away exactly what he wants them to retain? Has he made the main topics, the chief aim, stand out prominently enough? Can he merely stop speaking? These are quite important aspects of a grave responsibility.
In the third place—though this may be considered less important than the preceding—the speaker gives the impression that he has not actually "finished" his speech. No one cares for unfinished articles, whether they be dishes of food, pieces of furniture, poems, or speeches. Without unduly stressing the fact that a speech is a carefully organized and constructed product, it may be stated that it is always a profitable effort to try to round off your remarks. A good conclusion gives an impression of completeness, of an effective product. Audiences are delicately susceptible to these impressions.