"He mobilised the English language and sent it into battle" said Kennedy of Winston Churchill. That this should be the case is, however, something of a paradox, for the man who has been hailed as the greatest speaker of modern times was anything but a natural orator. He frankly admitted, "for many years, I was unable to say anything…I had not written out and committed to memory beforehand". Churchill suffered from a slight lisp and a voice that was not that of a classic orator: rather high-pitched and weak in tone, he was not able to blast speeches at audiences the way Gladstone could. His inability to speak impromptu was a more serious problem. His maiden speech took six weeks to prepare and was completely memorised. However, after a horrific incident in 1904 where he forgot his speech entirely, he was never able to speak in public again without copious notes. So, how was it that this man, so brilliant in conversation with small groups, but nervous to the point of feeling physically sick when in front of large audiences, became endowed with the reputation as the greatest speaker of the twentieth century?

Firstly, it should be remembered that Churchill was primarily a writer. Despite his other careers as a soldier and a politician, it was as a writer that Churchill made his name and earnt his living. This was a man who won the Nobel Prize for literature and became a modern-day millionaire entirely through the efforts of his pen. One need only glance at an average Churchill speech to see the high literary content of each and every one. Lloyd George was an incomparable debater, but you cannot derive pleasure from reading his speeches now: you certainly can with Churchill.

For example, one of the most beautiful passages from any Churchill book or speech: "History with its flickering lamp stumbles along the trail of the past, trying to reconstruct its scenes, to revive its echoes, and kindle with pale gleams the passion of former days."

The 1930s arguably produced the finest and most powerful examples of his rhetoric, yet due to the preponderance of 1940 quotations they are often forgotten: "So they go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent…They will say to me, 'A Minister of Supply is not necessary, for all is going well.' I deny it. 'The position is satisfactory.' It is not true. 'All is proceeding according to plan.' We know what that means".

One should not forget that one of the reasons that Churchill’s rhetoric worked so well in 1940 was the very fact that it has been written in advance of speaking, indeed some phrases had been used before, polished and reissued in time for the great trial. For example, Martin Gilbert quotes a line from the launch of a ship in 1935: "Never in the history of transatlantic travel has so much been done for those who travel tourist". This does not detract at all from the greatness of the more famous version of these lines: just that Churchill had a well-practised formula that he knew was effective and would work.

Closely allied to this is Churchill’s gift of the winning phrase. If one thinks of his talents as a speaker, a whole string of famous lines, many of which have passed into everyday usage, spring to mind: "the end of the beginning"; "their finest hour", "blood, toil, tears and sweat". One sentence, which sums up what sort of a man Churchill was, what he thought, and what he intended to do.

Churchill's skill, however, went deeper than the ability to growl encouragingly through the ether. In times of stress, or even when trying to make a political point, the need for humour and light relief is a vital tool. In this, Churchill was adept: "in three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken. Some chicken…some neck".

One of the most basic but effective rhetorical tools is the use of repetition. We can clearly see this in use with Churchill: "We will fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall never surrender". Perhaps the most dramatic example was given at Harrow School in 1941: "Never give in. Never, never, never, never…never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense". To compound the effect, he would often follow the repetition by an unexpected change of phrase at the end of the sentence, the verbal equivalent of a bucket of cold water on the audience: "inexorable, irresistible, benignant".

Linked to this tactic is the use of alliteration, of which Churchill was a master. For example: "We cannot fail or falter", "a man of light and learning" and "let us to the task, to the battle and the toil". These techniques are simple: but simplicity is the key to oratorical success.

From an early age Churchill was fascinated by history. Without doubt this historical underpinning played its part in Churchill’s success as an orator. A subconscious effect on his audience, perhaps, or maybe the link with his ancestor Marlborough. In any case, the references are obvious enough: "When Napoleon lay at Boulogne for a year with his flat-bottomed boats, he was told by someone ‘There are bitter weeds in England", being a suitably famous 1940 example. It was, to his contemporaries, as if he knew that Britain could not lose: it was not in her history.

It is often claimed by today that Churchill’s style of oratory is essentially false, too grandiloquent, too aggressive to be real. If that had been the case, however, he would never have convinced the British nation, let alone the USA and the world that what he said was true. Leaving changes in style aside, the truth is that in Churchill’s oratory the words reflected the man to an unusual degree. The reason that his oratory rang so true was that he passionately believed in what he was saying. Violet Bonham Carter expressed this succinctly when she said "there was nothing false, inflated, artificial in his eloquence". His world was built and fashioned in heroic lines. He spoke its language". His last speech to the House of Commons, on his resignation as Prime Minister in 1955, was made all the more poignant by being almost a farewell to him and his philosophy, as well as to his style of oratory: "Never flinch, never weary, never despair".

Perhaps this was helped by the mode of delivery he adopted. Although we regrettably have very few recordings of him in action, and all either radio or post-war special recordings (rather than the House of Commons which was his natural home,) we can still get a good idea of what it was like to listen to this man. Aspects of his character oozed through the radio, from the deliberate mispronunciation of "Nazi" as "Nahzee", to the growling passion of the perorations. Churchill knew that to leave pauses in certain places added to the power of his speeches: just listen to the slow and deliberate delivery of "Blood...toil…tears…and sweat".

Macaulay said that an orator's primary aim is to persuade his audience. This he cannot do if the audience does not believe in him, or if he gives promises that he cannot keep. Churchill fully appreciated the value of honesty when speaking to the nation: "What General Weygand called the Battle of France is over. I expect that the Battle of Britain is about to begin".

For all his learning, however, Churchill’s oratory would have been useless if it were inaccessible and obtuse. Like Shakespeare’s "Henry V", it was accessible because he spoke everyman’s language. As Robert Rhodes James points out, " he had the capacity to take very complex themes and topics, and reduce them not to simplicities and clichés but to terms that others could understand without being talked down to". Perhaps this was due to his use of metaphors, such as "a house of many mansions where there will be room for all", or "dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry". Perhaps it was his use of proverbs or literary allusions, to which so many in that pre-television age would have been aware. For example, his Tennyson quote in the Dunkirk speech "Every morn brought forth a noble chance, And every chance brought forth a noble knight". In any case, he certainly had the great gift of being able to explain complicated things to everyone. Many people disagreed with him. But everyone knew where he stood.

However, after reading the above, one could be forgiven for thinking that Churchill was an unparalleled speaker who never put a foot wrong. Of course, the truth was that alongside the genius of Churchill’s public speaking, there were many flaws that seriously impeded the effectiveness of his speeches, the efficacy of his cause, and his own chances of ministerial office, especially during the all-important 1930s.

One could argue that Churchill was just too in love with the power of his own language, and used it to full effect every time he rose to speak. This sounds wonderful to us, over fifty years down the line, but to contemporaries in the House of Common who heard him frequently, the powerful, often doom-laden rhetoric must have started to grind. This was especially true when he spoke of issues that were either relatively unimportant, or where he was in a majority of one. For example, on Indian Home Rule, which the vast majority of Conservatives viewed as an inevitable fact that had to be accepted gracefully, Churchill’s insistent predictions of doom for India and Britain completely overshadowed what he was actually saying. There was no sliding scale to Churchill’s rhetoric, it was either full power or not at all. Thus, he downvalued the power of his speaking. Beautiful, powerful speeches all of them, but delivered to half empty benches for much of the 1930s. The same thing goes for appeasement. By not tempering his criticisms, MPs just ceased to listen to him, with tragic consequences for the world.

Furthermore, venomous, though witty descriptions of colleagues helped to get his point across uniquely, but it did permanent damage to his relationship with those people. Describing Ghandi as a "half naked fakir" was an epithet that Indians to this day remember and resent, the Labour party never forgot his link between his wartime Labour colleagues and the Gestapo, whilst Ramsay Macdonald was described as a "boneless wonder": hardly a bridge-building description. One should not underestimate the effect that this had on Churchill’s chances of ministerial office. The fact that everyone knew that these comments had been prepared well in advance made them sting even more: MPs in the House of Commons can forgive rash comments, but not so easily those prepared at Chartwell weeks in advance and brought up specially for delivery.

His inability to utter more than a few words off the cuff could have disastrous consequences, as with his first ministerial speech in 1906. The new minister appeared with his beautifully crafted written speech, but unfortunately fatally misjudged the mood of the House. It ran against the notes he held in his hand, but he had no option but to struggle on. The disastrous reception to the speech would have crushed a lesser man, but he was back in a few weeks, with a speech that did hit the mark.

Despite the genuine charisma that was a part of his effectiveness, some people found him too theatrical, and distrusted him for it. A No. 10 Private Secretary bitterly complained in the crucial May days of 1940 that Churchill's language was "just blasted rhetoric…He is still thinking of his books". It is ironic that one of the greatest public speakers this country has ever produced should sometimes produce such a contradictory effect on his listeners, and that his greatest skill may have contributed to keeping him out of office during the 1930s.

So it can be seen that, despite all his prodigious talent, Winston Churchill did not always achieve the effect he sought, but through a mixture of hard work and natural talent, clearly deserves his reputation as the one of the most inspiring speakers ever to grace a platform.