Thanks to Alex Chalk for pointing me towards Michael Clarke's superb eulogy for Phillip Hughes.
You can watch it and read the transcript by clicking on the image (my screenshot taken from the BBC website).
Clarke demonstrates perfectly how a good eulogy must be planned to the last stroke. When emotion is as raw and unbearable as it is here, every rhetorical technique is essential.
This eulogy ticks every single box.
You can read the transcript and tick off the rhetorical questions, the antithesis, the three-part lists. This eulogy works under the surface as well as on it. The purpose and structure are beautifully realised.
Eulogies, like toasts and award speeches, are what the ancients called epideictic. We'd call them ceremonial. The person (usually a person) being celebrated might be called the honoree.
The purpose of a ceremonial speech is always tied to the occasion on which it is given. It also needs to articulate the idea or value the occasion represents. Here, Clarke binds honoree and value in one word: 'spirit'.
Persuasion always has a part in ceremonial speeches. But it's not quite the persuasion of a deliberative or judicial speech. Here, the argument needs to be:
- less rigid;
- more emotional; and
- more related to the significance of the event for the audience.
Clarke constructs a gentle argument connecting the idea of Hughes' spirit to the spirit of cricket. It's an argument using analogy that binds the audience to the event and creates a sense of shared belief.
Ceremonial speeches tend to have four main goals.
First, it commemorates the honoree. In doing so, the speaker must immediately establish the emotional nature of that commemoration. Not difficult in this case.
Clarke:
I don't know about you, but I keep looking for him. I know it is crazy but I expect any minute to take a call from him or to see his face pop around the corner.
Is this what we call the spirit? If so, then his spirit is still with me. And I hope it never leaves.
Second, it connects the honoree to the audience and to the event. The aim is to create an intimacy between all three elements, to make the audience feel that they belong to this occasion. Shared memories do the job perfectly, as do the many references to the shared values of the game.
Clarke:
Is this what we call the spirit of cricket? From the little girl in Karachi holding a candlelight tribute to masters of the game like Tendulkar, Warne and Lara showing their grief to the world, the spirit of cricket binds us all together.
Third, the speech creates a story or narrative about the honoree. The story should display characteristics of the honoree and events relating to it; the story should also demonstrate why the honoree is worthy of being celebrated. The goal is to tie the event to the past and to the future. Clarke uses the story of his own walk onto the pitch and the sense of Hughes's spirit being with him to evoke the man's character and significance.
Clarke:
I stood there at the wicket, I knelt down and touched the grass. I swear he was with me.
Picking me up off my feet to check if I was OK. Telling me we just needed to dig in and get through to tea. Telling me off for that loose shot I played. Chatting about what movie we might watch that night. And then passing on a useless fact about cows.
I could see him swagger back to the other end, grin at the bowler, and call me through for a run with such a booming voice a bloke in the car park would hear it.
Finally, the speech conveys the significance of the event. How does the honoree affect the lives of the audience? How will it continue to do so in the future? How will the audience act differently as a result of paying tribute to the honoree?
Clarke:
Phillip's spirit, which is now part of our game forever, will act as a custodian of the sport we all love. We must listen to it. We must cherish it. We must learn from it. We must dig in and get through to tea. And we must play on.
Ceremonial speeches use a variety of strategies to make their effect.
The speech will make careful use of emotional language. The speaker should choose specific terms and phrases that evoke the emotion they want to arouse in the audience.
Clarke:
The photos, the words, the prayers and the sense of communion in this loss from people across the globe have shown me his spirit in action. It has sustained me and overwhelmed me in equal measure.
The speech will always focus away from the speaker. The speaker’s ethical appeal in such a speech will not be on their own experience or expertise, but on the three features of ethos that relate the speaker to the honoree:
- the values demonstrated by the honoree
- the reasonable, practical wisdom demonstrated by the honoree
- the honoree’s dedication, benevolence, self-sacrifice or significance for society
Clarke:
And the love of my band of baggy green and gold brothers and sisters has held me upright when I thought I could not proceed. His spirit has brought us closer together - something I know must be him at work because it is so consistent with how he played and lived. He always wanted to bring people together and he always wanted to celebrate his love for the game and its people.
The speech will make connections between the event and the honoree as quickly as possible. Doing so helps the speaker focus on the honoree rather than themselves; it demonstrates the importance of the vent for the audience. The speech will include descriptions of the event and about the honoree, and they will repeatedly stress the connections between the two.
Clarke:
I'm deeply honoured to have been asked by Phillip's family to speak today. I am humbled to be in the presence of you, his family, his friends and his community. He was so proud of Macksville and it is easy to see why today.
Ceremonial speeches benefit from being short. Nobody ever wished a ceremonial speech to be longer. Not even a eulogy. Actually, especially not a eulogy. Clarke comes in at just under 5 minutes. More than time enough to make his point.