Lengua Inglesa Lingüística Aplicada: “Blood, Toil, Tears And Sweat”

The name of Winston Churchill will forever be associated with the heroic efforts of the free world to defeat the Axis powers in the Second World War and his reputation as a great orator was undeniably cemented by a succession of speeches he gave during these years of conflict. The purpose of this essay is to analyse the first of these discourses, commonly known as the “Blood, Toil, Tears andSweat” speech.

The historical context leading to this speech had witnessed an alarming sequence of events, specifically the rise of the fascist powers of Europe during the late 1920s culminating in the succession of Hitler to power in Nazi Germany in 1934 and the outbreak of war in September 1939. For many years the policy of appeasement had been seen as the most viable option for Britain underthe Chamberlain led Conservative government. However, the outbreak of war and a failure to unite the British political parties had led to the resignation of Chamberlain, and the appointment of Churchill as Prime Minister in May 1940. Churchill had for many years campaigned against appeasement as he believed that war with Germany was a terrible but inevitable eventuality. The German war machineconsiderably outweighed British military resources and so Churchill needed to use his great oratory skills to legendary effect in order to secure his political position, motivate the British and Allied peoples and, ultimately, to ensure victory.

Bungay (2011) explains that Churchill wrote his own speeches using a “romantic and verbose” style, and they were therefore “a very personal instrument”.Although his vocabulary could be considered old fashioned, the crisis of war brought about the “dramatic level necessary for Churchillian prose to be worthy”. Through his words and personality, Churchill forcefully yet eloquently imposed his belief and his vision of victory upon a nation, the world and history itself. The “Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat” speech can be considered as the start of thisprocess.

The genre of the speech was a political discourse; specifically a ‘call-to-arms’ speech to explain the situation at the time, justify the need to fight and persuade the listeners to follow the speaker’s resolve. The producer in the sense of writer and deliverer was Churchill on the occasion of his maiden speech as Prime Minster in the House of Commons on May 13th 1940. Churchill wasaddressing, in the first instance, the MPs present, and later, through radio broadcast and media reportage, the speech was received by the British public, and the wider world audience of 1940. The issue of acceptability can be addressed by recognising the formal and respectful aspects of the first half of the speech.

The speech (see Appendix A) consists of some 687 words and Churchill took justover five minutes to deliver it. For the purposes of analysis, it is convenient to divide the speech into two parts. The first part is a factual description and explanation of the forming of the War Cabinet, which Churchill was to lead. It is marked by its formal and respectful style, which confirms acceptability by the Commons audience. The mostly extensive verbs are initially in the past asChurchill explains events leading up to his address, then in present perfect as he details what he had arranged since becoming Prime Minister, and finally present and future with some verbs of opinion (‘hope’ and ‘trust’) as he outlines the next administration steps.

The first half of the speech concludes with an invitation to the MPs to accept the Government resolution "that this House welcomes theformation of a government representing the united and inflexible resolve of the nation to prosecute the war with Germany to a victorious conclusion." In other words, Churchill required the MPs to unite in order to wage war against Nazi Germany.

The second half begins in the same formal and functional style but with a development of the descriptive state into future intentions. Churchill...