From Stettin in the Baltic, to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent
…rank? (Not that I’m a fanboy of Churchill; and I only know that snippet anyway).
English, age mid-60’s; I know of both I have a dream and Gettysberg. I am more familiar with the former, and certainly not from history lessons at school. I think MLK casts a bigger shadow over English culture, probably because our fight against racism is somewhat echoic of the US’s. Certainly osmosis has done a better job for me in the case of I have a dream.
Hispano-German here, born 1964: I know I have a dream and can quote a couple of lines. I know what it is about and have seen bits and pieces in movies (Forrest Gump?). Gettysburg rings a bell, but I don’t know what it really is about. Will google it now, of course. Most famous? Churchill’s blood, sweat and tears was quoted by Supertramp in my misspent youth, that I remember. Anecdotical, of course. And Trump’s “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for ME” is big a big trauma in my subconscious. But being a Wahlberliner (someone who moved voluntarily to Berlin out of conviction) I would put Kennedy’s “Ich bin ein Berliner!” speech at number one.
What song was that? I also was a big Supertramp fan in my youth (rather childhood, I was 11 when “Breakfast In America” came out and I wore the grooves out of that album), but the only other Supertramp album I know and have is “Crime Of The Century”, and I don’t remember any allusions to Churchill’s speech.
ETA. correction, I also know and own “Famous Last Words”, but I already knew at 15 that this was a weak album.
Now that I have read it, I recognize many parts. It is a very good speech. One of those things you know, but on a subconscious level (outside the US). The kind of speech you wished was true today, but alas!
ETA: Ah! Spoons was faster, but I have a link
And concerning the “Ich bin ein Berliner”-speech, I just remembered my good late friend Holger Schneider, who told me he was there on the shoulders of his father. So that, if you feel generous, I have a Kennedy number of 2.
And the Rathaus Schöneberg, where he held that speech from the balcony, is a 15 minutes walk from my home
I concur that Kennedy’s Berlin speech was historical, at least for Germans, and especially for Berliners, but does anybody remember more than “Ich bin ein Berliner” from it?
Two thousand years ago, the proudest boast was civis romanus sum [“I am a Roman citizen”]. Today, in the world of freedom, the proudest boast is “Ich bin ein Berliner!”… All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words “Ich bin ein Berliner!”
This might be a big element of it. Any kid can dress up as a recognizable Lincoln. Not so much with MLK, at least not without running into some… unfortunate iconography.
“Four score and seven years ago, our forefathers…” also lends itself to the kind of over-the-top dramatization that a kid can pull off.
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I am really interested in folks who say “Gettysburg.” Are we thinking about what makes a speech famous differently?
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I would have chosen the Gettysburg Address because I know more of it. Someone upthread mentioned it was only 2 minutes long. I’m sure I’ve read it multiple times. " The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here,…", “government of the people, by the people, for the people…”; it’s rhetorical and flowery, but also direct and succinct.
The I Have a Dream speech was 17 minutes long. I don’t think I’ve ever heard the whole thing. I don’t know the real speech, just the Greatest Hits version.
