Author Description

"The reliance of individual presidents on their speechwriters has varied with the rhetorical skill of the officeholder himself, his managerial style, and his personal attitude toward public speaking. The individual chapters here (two by former White House speech-writers) give fascinating insight into the process and development of presidential speechwriting from Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration to Ronald Reagan's. Some contributors, such as Charles Griffin writing on Eisenhower and Moya Ball on Johnson, offer case studies of specific speeches to gain insight into those presidents. Other chapters focus on institutional arrangements and personal relationships, rhetorical themes characterizing an administration, or the relationship between words and policies to shed light on presidential speechwriting.". "Medhurst's introduction of ten "myths" in the scholarship on presidential speeches and his summary of the enduring issues in the practice of speechwriting pull together the work of individual contributors. At the same time, his introduction and conclusion transcend particular presidents by providing generalizations on the role of speechwriting in the modern White House."--BOOK JACKET.