What are some of the best motivational speeches you have heard? Fictional (movie or book!) or real speeches before a battle. I'm working on one for my novel and am interested to hear ones that caught your eye/ear to study. One of my favorites is the one the President gives in Independence Day: “Good morning. In less than an hour, aircraft from here will join others from around the world. And you will be launching the largest aerial battle in the history of mankind. “Mankind.” That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can’t be consumed by our petty differences anymore. We will be united in our common interests. Perhaps it’s fate that today is the Fourth of July, and you will once again be fighting for our freedom… Not from tyranny, oppression, or persecution… but from annihilation. We are fighting for our right to live. To exist. And should we win the day, the Fourth of July will no longer be known as an American holiday, but as the day the world declared in one voice: We will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish without a fight! We’re going to live on! We’re going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day!”
The LOTR speech in the third movie with that epic song playing in the background. It's like the Fields of something... But I'd love to see a movie where some jackass is giving a speech before a battle, and some cheeky fucker from the opposing side shoots an arrow right through his chest.
Yass, I love that one too. "I see in your eyes the same fear that would take the heart of me..." And gotta love that music. A great soundtrack.
This is Robert Burn's vision of what Robert the Bruce said to his troops before the Battle of Bannockburn. (Which the Scots won.) https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43813/scots-wha-hae
Closest thing to a motivational speech I've ever written: In the morning we march for battle. For those of you that have been through this already, you know what to do. For those of you that haven't: tomorrow you may live and tomorrow you may die. Adhere to your duty and your training and live or die you will do so with honour. Abandon that duty and exchange your honour for your life, and rest assured I will do everything within my considerable power to leave you with neither.
In the video game Halo, one of the characters gives different motivational speeches depending on the difficulty. The hardest difficulty has probably the greatest motivational speech ever put in a video game.
Before the battle of Tali-Ihantala, WW2, Finland <=> Soviet Union, in Finnish side. The long, complicated and ideological motivational speech: "We keep these positions or die." (The main front was 10-15 km. Russians lost 600 tanks, 120-280 airplanes, total Russian casulties 27 500... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Tali-Ihantala That pep talk worked well. It suited Finnish mentality just right. Everyone knew the options.
Churchill, of course, was capable of giving a rousing speech. Here are a few classics: "Even though large tracts of Europe and many old and famous States have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Gestapo and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule, we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender..." "I would say to the House as I said to those who have joined this government: "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat". We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and of suffering. You ask, what is our policy? I will say: It is to wage war, by sea, land and air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us; to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark and lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy. You ask, what is our aim? I can answer in one word: Victory. Victory at all costs—Victory in spite of all terror—Victory, however long and hard the road may be, for without victory there is no survival." "...if we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new dark age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science. Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves, that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was their finest hour.""
Being a Texan, I am partial to Col. Travis’ last letter from the Alamo. http://www.travisletter.com/the-letter.html
Actually I would have said his final speech on the eve of the 13th day but it was not documented at the time. It was written some 40 years later, and of course the principals were all dead. May have come from the memoirs of mrs Dickinson. The writer later acknowledged he made up one paragraph but never said which one. Whatever Travis said, he convinced 188 men to stay and die. Only 1 did not - Louis Rose, a French veteran and mercenary.