"Allow failure to be an option": Lupita Nyong'o at the Massachusetts Conference for Women

Lupita Nyong'o delivered this keynote speech on 4 December 2014.  It's brave and inspiring. 

And it offers three powerful lessons for any speechmaker. 

Construct your speech like a symphony.  Set up a theme and then develop it in four movements (this is Marcus Webb's idea, not mine):

1.  Main theme, excitement (the issue)
2.  Variations on the theme (list of facts)
3.  Battle or storm (intense, short, a promise of action)
4.  Reprise the main theme: triumph (take us to the future)

And a coda: affection for, and confidence in, the audience.

Nyong'o's first movement actually introduces two themes (in the time-honoured tradition of sonata form, but let that pass...): pursuing a dream, and overcoming fear.  She develops the tension between these two themes in the following movements (indicated by headings in the transcript).  Each movement ends in an emotional climax and a moment of suspense, driving us on to the next.  It's a profoundly satisfying structure.

Write tight, then riff.  It's fascinating to see Nyong'o using the script and not simply reciting it.  She starts with a lengthy, improvised address to the audience and fellow speakers.  On occasions she improves on her text as she speaks it.  At one point, she deletes a quotation because the pressure of the delivery demands it.  You need the security of a well written text, so that you can riff off it when you want to.

Embrace vulnerability.  It's not easy, being truly open with your audience.  Who wants to highlight their faults and failures?  But making the audience a gift of your vulnerability is exactly what will make your audience trust you.  (It's all part of what Aristotle called the ethical appeal.)   Nyong'o makes that gift, not because she wants her audience to trust and love her, but because she feels she owes it to us to be honest.

The first secret of speechwriting is finding the right themes.  The second is understanding how to put them in tension.  The third is creating the structure that allows you to take risks. 

Lupita Nyong'o shows us how it's done.

Explore more of the speechwriter's craft: The Essentials of Speechwriting runs in London on 13 March 2015.