THE YOUNG SPEAKER: AN INTRODUCTION TO THE UNITED STATES SPEAKER; DESIGNED TO FURNISH EXERCISES IN BOTH READING AND SPEAKING, FOR PUPILS BETWEEN THE AGES OF SIX AND FOURTEEN; COMPRISING SELECTIONS IN PROSE, POETRY, AND DIALOGUE, AND A VARIETY OF FIGURES, ILLUSTRATING PRINCIPLES OF POSITION AND GESTURE. BY JOHN E. LOVELL, FORMERLY INSTRUCTOR OF ELOCUTION IN THE MOUNT PLEASANT CLASSICAL TENTH EDITION. CINCINNATI: PUBLISHED BY TRUMAN & SPOFFORD. 111 MAIN STREET. CRC PUBLIC LIBRARY Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1844, by DURRIE & PECK, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Connecticut. PREFACE. THIS little work has been prepared for young students. It is divided into five parts. PART FIRST is designed to accomplish these objects: 1. To guard the pupil against errors in Pronunciation, which occur, not unfrequently, in the conversation and reading of persons respectably educated. 2. To make him acquainted with the names and uses of the grammatical and rhetorical Pauses. 3. To teach him the nature of Inflection, and the application of the simple slides to the most obvious and useful cases. 4. To acquaint him with the nature and importance of Emphasis. 5. To instruct him as to the management of the Voice, and its adaptation to different kinds of composition. These lessons are brief and simple, so that few pupils who have reached their tenth year will find it difficult either to understand or apply them, while some even under that age may, it is believed, study them with advantage. PART SECOND comprises a set of lessons intended exclusively for Reading. They are of an instructive and interesting character; well suited to cultivate a correct and graceful style of Elocution, and at the same time to improve the heart and enlighten the mind. Being chiefly in prose, they will, with the lessons in part fourth, balance any excess of poetry which may appear in the selections arranged for Recitation. PART THIRD. This division of the book constitutes its chief distinctive feature. The lessons consist of short and interesting extracts in prose and poetry. They are designed as single pieces for Recitation. Not one of the whole number-more than one hundred and fifty-has been adopted without a careful examination as to its fitness for this object. The mere brevity of these selections gives them great value as exercises for beginners. The teacher who has been much engaged in instructing young persons to speak, will appreciate them for this peculiarity alone. But they possess other characteristics which entitle them to favor. They are, for the most part, on subjects interesting to the youthful mind, and expressed in language, plain, beautiful, and easily understood. They are such, withal, as seem to prompt a necessary and natural style of gesticulation. They have elicited a preference, in this respect, from among hundreds of other excellent pieces. It is in Gesture, that schoolboys generally cut such a sorry figure. There is no propriety, no meaning, no elegance in their untutored action. It is almost uniformly a senseless, awkward, monotonous "sawing of the air." With a desire to promote improvement, therefore, in this beautiful and important branch of the art of Speaking, a number of Figures, each exhibiting some appropriate gesture, have been introduced into this division of the Young Speaker. Each is applied to a particular passage, and accompanied with an explanation. Next to the exam ple of an accomplished instructor-who is not often to be obtained, for this subject has been most singularly neglected-no doubt, good pictures are the best medium of instruction. The idea is, that the pupil will be benefited thus ;-the gestures presented in these picsures will be impressed upon his imagination, and he will address them to other similar passages, as occasion shall require, and ability direct. The plan is at least original; how far it shall prove serviceable, must depend upon the fairness of experiment, and the intelligent judgment of others. PART FOURTH comprises a set of Reading lessons in prose, corresponding to those of part third; differing only in the advanced style of the composition. PART FIFTH Consists of Dialogues, with a few pieces arranged in that form, for alternate Speaking. They are, chiefly, short, interesting, and of a juvenile character. Teachers will please to keep in mind, that these lessons, and those of part third, though selected with special reference to Recitation, are equally well adapted to the cultivation of a spirited, correct, and manly style of Reading. The work has been prepared for the use of a very interesting class of students; and with the hope, that it may inspire many a young mind with the love of moral and intellectual excellence, it is submitted to a candid public. NEW HAVEN, Nov. 1, 1845. J. E. L. |