Verona. Yesterday afternoon I was a typical tourist with an iPhone taking snapshots and savoring the winter sun. The Italian wing of @burnmagazine is gathered to help get me through my TEDx talk tonight, drink some fine wines, and plan our future publishing ventures. My talk is titled Art as Life under the broad TEDx theme of Beyond the Wall where I will be part of a 12 speaker ensemble. As a kid in grade school I was unable and terrified to even stand in front of my class to make a book report, and this totally feels like that. I am totally looking forward to this being over. Mrs.McClannan, my 6th grade teacher, would understand. She did introduce me to Shakespeare so I guess it all makes sense. Stay tuned. #Tedx #verona
DAVID
I know exactly how you feel. My experience is that I do all right when I [1] know well the subject that I’m talking about (which you do), [2] don’t read the speech but only have the type of notes that could be “written on a shirt cuff” only to remind me of the order of the major points, and [3] move around on the stage, to make better contact with the audience, instead of standing still at the podium. Having seen you in videos I’m sure your charisma will take over and you’ll do great. Good luck!
Now, I can’t resist telling a story. Some years ago when living for two years in Tokyo I had to give a speech to some 300 people. I started to think how to start the talk. Then, a Japanese friend told me the following joke. He said, “An American businessman had to give a speech in Tokyo and consulted a Japanese friend whom he told that in States speakers often start with a joke to warm up the audience. The Japanese friend said, ‘No, that won’t do at all. A Japanese speaker never tells a joke, as it doesn’t look serious. Instead, a Japanese starts with an apology, saying, for example, I’m sorry that you’ve had to take precious time out of your busy day to come to listed to such a poor speaker as myself..’ So, while waiting for his turn to speak, the American was still thinking how to start his speech. But, when he was called to the podium, he suddenly knew what to do. He went up, bowed deeply and said, ‘I am sorry that I cannot tell a joke.'”
At that time I was studying Japanese and wrote out the above story in Japanese in roman letters and asked my Japanese teacher to correct it. When the day came for the speech, I got up on the podium — and started to tell the story in Japanese. The Japanese interpreter doing simultaneous translation, which the audience could hear with their earphones, was momentarily confused and it took some seconds for her to realize that I was speaking in Japanese and not English. A hush fell over the hall and I had their full attention. When I came to the punch line of “I’m sorry that I cannot tell a joke” there was loud laugher followed by thunderous applause. Next, I said, “I’d better switch to English now before I get into too much trouble.” When I finished the talk there was prolonged thunderous applause as well. Suddenly, I had the sensation of knowing how a charismatic politician or a great actor feels when he or she is applauded like this — and how such a person feels when that laughter or applause no longer comes. Now, in Italy, you have to…
I suppose you’re going back to New York after Verona. I’m leaving Paris for the Washington DC area on the 14th and hope to be able to visit you in New York as you suggested. (I’ll be back in Paris on October and then in Bangkok in October-February).
Cheers, Mitch/Paris