Funeral Speech

To be honest, I'm really not sure what to blog about so if you were hoping for an interesting post I am sorry to disappoint.  It would be in your best interest to stop reading now.  Save yourself the time, I won't tell you anything you don't already know.  Ok, well if you've gotten this far then I might as well make an attempt to entertain you.  Then you can shut down your computer and forget everything that you've just read.  My name is Ryan and I am a bored blogger.  I am a bored blogger writing a post that some will read and some won't.  Don't you understand? Isn't it clear? I'll tell you things that you already know.  I'm writing this blog post for AP Literature and you are reading it.  Ms. Marcy will read this and give it a grade and that is all.  The post that I have written will be read by many and graded by one and nothing will come out of it.  So that's it.  You know the story as do I.  All I have left to tell is that which I already have done.  My name is Ryan and I am a bored blogger writing a post that people will read and forget.  Read, and not read at the same time.

I hope it was clear, but the above was my attempt at mimicking the narrator's speech at Clifton's funeral.  We discussed it a little bit in class, and I thought it was interesting how people reacted to it in different ways.  Some hated it, while others enjoyed it.  In my opinion, the speech is a little bit of both.  Although it's depressing to hear the narrator speak in this fashion to people at such a monumental event, there is no getting around the fact that this speech is incredibly effective.  I'm sure there's a name for the technique he uses, I just don't know the term.  In most speeches, the speaker gradually increases in intensity and emotion, trying to remain connected to and a part of the audience.  In this speech though, the narrator addresses the audience directly and seems disconnected from them, almost annoyed at their presence.  In conventional speeches the speaker gives the audience ideas and rallies them around the ideas.  In the narrator's speech though, it's almost like he's challenging them to think of ideas.  He speaks plainly and gives the bare details, leaving the audience to work itself up. In my opinion, this is more effective than a conventional speech.