Winston Churchill

"In the past, several prime ministers and ministers of foreign affairs and even two Presidents of the United States have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Now, for the first time, a great statesman has received the Prize in Literature." The Nobel Prize laureate to which G. Liljestrand, member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, is referring to is Winston Churchill. Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature of 1953, "for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values", as was stated in the presentation ceremony.

Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was born on November 30, 1974, to Lord Randolph Churchill and Jennie Jerome Churchill. He is most known for his work in the British government, especially in his role as prime minister during World War II. However, Churchill also had a wonderful skill at both writing and public speaking. These are the skills for which he won both a Nobel and a Pulitzer prize.

One interesting oratory technique that Winston utilized was prepared impromptu speeches. These were speeches for which he had already written the notes, but in those notes he placed specific commands for effects such as pausing and groping for words. Later, when he gave the speech, he would read the speech and follow his notes for pausing, groping for words, etc. This gave his prepared speech an impromptu appearance which made the speech have more listener appeal.

Because he was able to grab his audience's attention very effectively, Winston Churchill was a great orator. This was probably one reason for his great success as the British Prime Minister—he was able to grab the soldiers attention and give them courage through his speaking. The other great orator using this technique at the time of World War II was Hitler, and in viewing Hitler's orative skills and the effect they had, we should be thankful to God that we had Churchill to strengthen our forces just as Hitler was strengthening his forces through courage. There have been many examples of times when Churchill's speeches have strengthened soldiers and given them the ability to continue fighting in times of disaster.

Churchill was also a skilled writer. He wrote fifty books, a novel, three short stories, over eight hundred articles, a film script, and many other works. One major topic of his works was history. He wrote two biographies and several articles related to the history of wars. A good example is "Old Battlefields of Virginia" published in his book Finest Hour, and available online at http://www.winstonchurchill.org/ffhwsc2.htm.

In "Old Battlefields of Virginia", the theme is the modernization of the United States and the fact that the North is more advanced technologically than the South (at the time he wrote the article). However, the main motif in this work is why the North was more advanced—the Civil War depleted the South's resources. Churchill uses incredible detail and brilliant diction to outline several of the Battles of the Civil War; in that section Churchill displays his skill at portraying historical events. He switches back and forth through history, first outlining a battle, then his studies of the battle, then on to his travels to where the battle occurred. This heightens reader interest and keeps the reader engaged; you never know what he will discuss next.

Churchill learned much of his writing skills from reading and analyzing others works. He read and then memorized much of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, and also studied Gibbon and Macaulay's works. He admired the techniques each author used and loved it when words fit together to produce a smooth sounding tone. He learned from each writer's individual writing style and applied those techniques in his own works.

Churchill despised and often poked fun at the pompous language of socialism. He once said that the "jargon of socialism is almost as bad a socialism itself. The do not speak of 'the poor.' No, the say 'marginal stipend maintainers.' They do not talk of 'house' or 'home.' No, it's 'local accommodation unit.' I suppose the Socialists will soon requisition those old samplers our grannies knitted and change them to read 'God bless our local accommodation unit'." (James C. Humes, The Sir Winston Method (New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1991), pg. 57).

Winston Churchill was a wonderful leader, and a God-send to the Allied Forces during WWII. However, he was also a great writer and orator. He truly deserved the Nobel and Pulitzer prizes he received.

Hi, my name's Robbie Rothermel, and I wrote this essay as part of my Advanced Placement English Language and Composition class. I started researching Winston Churchill's life and found he was a pretty cool guy. You might like to find out more about him by going to the Winston Churchill Center webpage, or reading Never Give In: The Extraordinary Character of Winston Churchill by Stephen Mansfield.

document written 11/30/99