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The Spike: or, Victoria College Review, June 1909

Debating Contest

Debating Contest

"Confusion, and illusion and relation,
Elusion, and occasion, and evasion."

Idylls of the King.

Judges: His Execellency Lord Plunket, K.C.V.O.; His Honour Mr. Justice Denniston' and J.W. Joynt, Esq., M.A.

Subject: "That the creation of small navies for defence purposes should be encouraged in the self-governing States of the Empire."

page 24

For the fourth time in succession Victoria College has won the joint Debating Scroll, and for the fourth time her successful representatives have been men hitherto untried in these contests. Professor von Zeidlitz [sic] occupied the chair, and briefly explained the method of conducting the debate to a packed audience. The notes of the judges, which speak for themselves, Are as follows:—

"In accordance with the usual practice, the judges at The recent debate beg to submit a few observations and impressions. Instead of going through the speeches in detail, they will throw their remarks into a general from, occasionally alluding to a speech by way of illustration.

"The subject had the advantages of a direct and specific bearing on contemporary problems, to an extent which was not foreseen at the time of its selection. The effect of this was to remove the discussion from the region of an academic rhetorical exercise, and to give it the character of an attempted solution of a definite practical question. This character, however, was not maintained throughout. There were occasional flights of artificial rhetoric, purpurei penni, which could never have appeared in a debate on which a practical policy was really to follow. Some of the speeches did not rise to the occasion; others rose too high, and acquired a touch of unreality in consequence. Others, again, grappled with the question with an air that meant business. There were marked differences, too, in the evidences of previous preparation and study. Some speakers had obviously tried to get at the bottom of the question; others had been satisfied with superficial generalization, which sounded well enough but ignored the vital elements of the problem. There was one good peroration—that form of ornament which Was supposed to have received its death blow from Lord Beaconsfield— viz… that of the first Otago speaker.

"There were curious diversities in the modes of using notes. The first Wellington speaker seemed to be reading almost all the time, though the judges were informed he was not really reading at all. The first Auckland speaker, whose volubility almost bewildering, occasionally drew a blank on his memory; and there follow that awkward, chilling pause, which gives a frosty air to even excellent speeches. The first Canterbury speaker discarded notes altogether, but the effect thus gained was discounted by a certain air of unreality and want of conviction, which pervaded the speaker's manner generally. So, too, with attitude and gesture. Let it be said once for all that movements of the arms should never be resorted to unless they are in page 25 absolute harmony with the sentiment, and adopted to import additional force and effect to what is being said. As for attitude a mean must be struck between the stiffness of the parade ground and the meaningless ramble about the platform. There was a good deal of unnatural stooping and swaying of the body. When Gladstone stooped, the audience almost held its breath; and when he shot himself into an erect posture again, the effect was electric. It might not be out of place to suggest that aspiring orators should cultivate physical exercise, in order to obtain the freedom and grace of bodily movement, which count for so much in the general effect produced.

"It is somewhat painful to discern that solecisms, born of diction and of pronunciation, are still rampant and flourishing. It is needless to give example; some were so glaring as to be reproduced in the newspapers. This is a very serious matter; and so long as such abuses are allowed to prevail, our University speakers are simply disqualifying themselves from ever addressing a cultivated assembly. If we cannot look to our University Colleges for a pure style of speaking the English language, where are we to look? Students should study more seriously the best models of oratorical diction. If they cannot read Demosthenes or Cocero with ease, they can at least read Burke, Bright Chamberlain and Balfour. Again, in the matter of pronunciation the young speaker might do much for himself. Let him read aloud every day three or four pages of a great speech. He should do it slowly and deliberately, giving every vowel its full value, and cutting the final consonants clear form entanglement with secondary words. He is not to speak like this when the time comes; but musicians know that the price which is to be played rapidly must be practiced slowly.

"The debate was won by superior training. It was manifest that the Victoria College speakers were "fitter" in a debating sense, than the others. And this superiority was the result not merely of a few weeks preparation, but of a more steady and systematic attention to the business of debating. This annual competition is not effecting its object unless systematic study and preparation become the rule instead of the exception."