Bradfield College Demosthenes Competition Sucess

On Thursday March 6th Tom and Tom (Yr 7), and James and James (Yr 6) competed in the annual Bradfield College Demosthenes Competition. They won the Combined School Prize, which is for ‘excellence in the art of witty and eloquent public speaking’.

Each pair chose and prepared a short talk in the vein of an after dinner speech; our Year 7 pair choose ‘What Parents Never Understand’ and our Year 6 team elected to discuss ‘A World Without Television’. We were up against eight other prep schools, all equally as determined to take home the top prizes.

James and James went first, and in a lively two handed approach carefully unveiled for the audience a world (shock and horror) without television with a number of thought provoking examples. Tongue firmly in cheek, James began the argument by declaring ‘he like…nay scratch that, let’s commit here boys – LOVED television!’ James countered with a studied ignorance on the topic, arguing instead for the simple pleasures of live theatre and enjoying real experiences. James employed several persuasive techniques and by the end of the talk he had convinced his audience that everyone should buy a happy meal ‘nutritionally devoid of anything except deep fried sawdust’.

Tom and Tom guided their audience through their carefully constructed argument as to firstly how outrageously out of date parents were; secondly how they came to be thus. Using a variety of well written examples with excellent comic timing, the boys concluded that wonderful normal children must go to a vile place called an office where their training began. Consequently adults learned to shun mess and video games, and desire coffee and clean desks. Their performance was effortless and pitch perfect. The judge commented that their talk included the best description of a tomato (a venom filled, disgusting spawn of Satan; a fruit parading around as a vegetable) he had ever heard.

Both teams earned second place in their respective categories but rightly claimed the best overall performance for a school.