Successful Methods of Public Speaking

Successful Methods of Public Speaking is a guide to public speaking by Grenville Kleiser, the Canadian American writer on rhetoric, business success, and self improvement who lived from 1868 to 1935. Kleiser was one of the most prolific and commercially successful early twentieth century American writers of self improvement and business education books, producing dozens of substantial volumes on public speaking, vocabulary improvement, business correspondence, and various other practical subjects.

The book belongs to the substantial body of early twentieth century American public speaking instruction that responded to the growing recognition that public speaking ability was an important professional and business skill in the increasingly complex commercial and political world of the period. Kleiser had himself trained as a public speaker and had taught public speaking professionally before turning to full time writing, and his various books on the subject drew on his practical experience in addition to his substantial reading in the classical rhetorical tradition.

The book covers the standard topics that a serious public speaking guide of the period would address. There are sections on the physical aspects of public speaking including voice production, breath control, posture, and gesture. There are sections on the intellectual preparation of speeches including the selection of subjects, the research and organization of material, the construction of effective openings and closings, and the use of supporting evidence and illustrative examples. There are sections on the various special situations that public speakers face including after dinner speeches, ceremonial addresses, political speeches, business presentations, and the various other forms that public speaking takes in modern professional life.

Kleiser’s approach throughout combines practical instruction with the kind of moral and motivational framework that characterized the broader American self improvement literature of the early twentieth century. The book assumes that effective public speaking is a learnable skill, that the principles of effective speaking can be set out systematically, and that diligent practice along the lines the book recommends will produce real improvement in the practical abilities of the reader.

The book runs about three hundred pages and is best read by working through the various sections as topics of current practical interest. For readers interested in the early twentieth century American self improvement and business education literature, this is a representative example. It pairs naturally with Kleiser’s other books on public speaking and rhetoric.