So you’ve been asked to speak publicly. Feel free to sweat profusely, rifle through some $10 vocab words, pick out what you’ll wear, sweat some more. But first: Ask how much time you have to speak. “Organizers usually have an answer,” says linguist David Crystal in his 2016 book, The Gift of the Gab, which explores the mechanics of eloquence. “They know, from bitter experience, how much their audience can take before they start to fidget and look at their watches. Distrust any organizer who replies with, ‘Oh, as long as you like.’
That goes for any form of public speaking, whether it’s a wedding toast or a work presentation. Fans of extemporaneous speaking or the hour-long Winston Churchill speech may sniff at the idea of the well-timed talk, but the truth is that natural-sounding speeches that sound like they were made up on the spot can be some of the most well-rehearsed.