Articulate Speech Quotes

Speak properly, and in as few words as you can, but always plainly; for the end of speech is not ostentation, but to be understood.

As it is the characteristic of great wits to say much in few words, so small wits seem to have the gift of speaking much and saying nothing.

It is not enough that a man has clearness of vision, and reliance on sincerity, he must also have the art of expression, or he will remain obscure.

Good communication does not mean that you have to speak in perfectly formed sentences and paragraphs. It isn't about slickness. Simple and clear go a long way.

I've always been very wordy; I've got a great vocabulary.

The more articulate one is, the more dangerous words become.

The ability to speak well is the shortcut to distinction.

Those who write as they speak, even though they speak well, write badly.

Everything that can be said, can be said clearly.

Even so, sometimes I wish I did have a little bit more flair in my language.

What writing a poem really does - and what figuring how to perform effectively really does - is forces people to listen to you. It frames your thoughts in such a way that grabs people's attentions and forces them to hear the things that you're actually saying.

I was playing with Chuck Berry, who sounded like an English teacher. Did you ever listen to his records? He pronounces every word.

Words should be only the clothes, carefully custom-made to fit the thought.

Whatever we well understand we express clearly, and words flow with ease.

Have something to say, and say it as clearly as you can. That is the only secret.

I have not wanted syllables where actions have spoken so plainly.

To many men well-fitting doors are not set on their tongues.

Hank Cochran was a man of very few words, but certainly the words that he chose were the right ones to use.

It's not 'natural' to speak well, eloquently, in an interesting, articulate way. People living in groups, families, communes say little - have few verbal means. Eloquence - thinking in words - is a byproduct of solitude, deracination, a heightened painful individuality. In groups, it's more natural to sing, to dance, to pray: given, rather than invented (individual) speech.

Her fluency was marvelous. She would say things at random, intricate, flamelike, or slide off into a parenthetical limbo peppered with fireworks-- admirable linguistic feats which a practiced writer might struggle for hours to achieve.

So it's not a thing that's a struggle. It's work, but it's not a struggle. It's fun. And she had a very particular way of emphasizing points and making her point, and that had to do with bringing out a word that you didn't normally think was the most important word in the sentence.

You have no right to go before a public without an adequate technique, just because you feel. Anything feels - a leaf feels, a storm feels - what right have you to do that? You have to have speech, and it's a cultivated speech.

Eloquence is the art of saying as little as possible but making it sound as much as possible.

The devil take these people and their language! They take a dozen monosyllabic words in their jaws, chew them, crunch them and spit them out again, and call that speaking. Fortunately they are by nature fairly silent, and although they gaze at us open-mouthed, they spare us long conversations.

Learn how to communicate, learn how to speak.