Book 220 - A Year of Magical Learning

Reflection Title: 272 Words!

Book – Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America by Garry Wills

Book Description:

In a masterly work, Garry Wills shows how Lincoln reached back to the Declaration of Independence to write the greatest speech in the nation’s history.

The power of words has rarely been given a more compelling demonstration than in the Gettysburg Address. Lincoln was asked to memorialize the gruesome battle. Instead he gave the whole nation “a new birth of freedom” in the space of a mere 272 words. His entire life and previous training and his deep political experience went into this, his revolutionary masterpiece.

By examining both the address and Lincoln in their historical moment and cultural frame, Wills breathes new life into words we thought we knew, and reveals much about a president so mythologized but often misunderstood. Wills shows how Lincoln came to change the world and to effect an intellectual revolution, how his words had to and did complete the work of the guns, and how Lincoln wove a spell that has not yet been broken.

Reflection:

272 Words!

272 words is all it took for Abraham Lincoln to deliver his remarks on honoring the dead that so bravely fought at Gettysburg while doing his best to re-unite a nation around the ideas of why we started this grand experiment called America in the first place.

Before this book, I honestly can’t remember if I’ve ever actually read the Gettysburg Address before in my life. Of course, we all know the opening line “4 score and 7 years ago, our fathers…”

After the…I had no idea what really came next until I read this book. Apparently, it was only a mere 264 more words. Dr. King spoke for 16 minutes and 1,600+ words in his epic, “I Have a Dream” speech. I would have thought Lincoln would have spoken for 10 minutes or more in the Gettysburg address given the significance of this speech in the importance of the history of our country. Turns out I was wrong.

Here’s the thing that Lincoln new that so many of us can’t understand (myself included); words don’t matter…it is what you say that matters!

We can talk for days about nothing, or you can take the time to refine your thoughts and choose your words carefully to say something that matters.

It’s ironic that Lincoln’s masterful speech got one major thing clearly wrong when he said, “The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.”

It is through our words that what people do lives forever. Tell your story, always be impeccable with your words, and people will remember.

Question: How can you say more while talking less?

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Links:

What is The Year of Magical Learning? - An Introduction

YOML Podcast Discussion - Coming Soon

YOML Bookstore - Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America by Garry Wills