チャーチル 3大スピーチ

先ほどのスピーチと合わせて、1940年台に立て続けに名スピーチといわれるものをチャーチルはおこなったようで、動画で特徴を語ってくれています。

13 May 1940 Blood, toil, tears and sweat

4 June 1940 We shall fight on the beaches

18 June 1940 Finest hour

Blood, toil, tears and sweatもよく聞きますよね。5ポンド紙幣の裏面はチャーチルだそうですが、I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.も書かれているとか。

今回取り上げるのはFinest hourの方。シェイクスピアのヘンリー5世を意識したものだとか。

（オックスフォード）

Henry V

a play (1599) by Shakespeare which celebrates the military victories in France of King Henry V. It contains several famous patriotic speeches, including the king’s famous speech before the battle of Agincourt. There have been two film versions of the play, the first in 1944, directed by Laurence Olivier with himself as Henry, and the second in 1989, directed by Kenneth Branagh,who also played the title role. 

“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;For he today that sheds his blood with meShall be my brother.” 

Henry V

Agincourt

a battle fought in northern France in 1415, between the French and the English under King Henry V. Though there were many more French soldiers, the English won and were then in a strong position to take much of France. Agincourt is especially remembered because it forms an important part of Shakespeare’s play Henry V.

famous patriotic speechesと書かれていますが、その一つが以下のもの。1944年と最近のBBCドラマから同じスピーチを。これがfinest hourのスピーチに影響を与えているとか。

Hollow Crown トム・ヒドルストン

このスピーチの部分の英語と日本語はこちらのブログで紹介されています。

こちらの記事はヘンリー5世のチャーチルへの影響を簡潔に書いてある記事です。1940年8月のRAFの活躍を讃える言葉とfinest hourののスピーチを説明してくれています。

Henry V and World War II

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.

"Henry V"

Act 4, Scene 3, Line 62

At the height of the Battle of Britain in August 1940, Churchill pronounced some of his most famous speeches of the war. His moving and defiant words were reminiscent of the speech by Shakespeare’s Henry V before the Battle of Agincourt. 

Churchill was very moved during a visit to the operations room at Uxbridge, which was tracking the course of the Battle of Britain. He said to General Ismay, “Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few.” A few days later he used the phrase in a speech to the House of Commons, making it one of his most famous speeches of the war. 

Another famous speech occurred two months earlier, after the rescue of British forces from Dunkirk. Churchill rallied the nation with defiant words worthy of Henry V before the Battle of Agincourt on St. Crispin’s day. Henry said, “And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by, / From this day to the ending of the world,/ But we in it shall be remembered” (Act 4, Scene 3, Lines 59-61). Churchill echoed him: “if the British Empire … lasts for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour.'”