Irishman Speaks - Conor Cunneen

Mark Twain, the most successful of all humorous keynote speakers (even if he was not Irish!), was an inveterate smoker. “I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time,” he said during one of the speeches that saw him lauded as the finest humorous inspirational business keynote speaker – even if not on foodservice or financial services – of his era. While this speech was on a topic dear to his heart, it did not reach the levels of many of his wonderful speeches.

Given that Mark Twain left this earth in 1910, he will not be available should you be seeking an inspirational, motivational, humorous keynote speaker. However, don’t despair, the Irish keynote speaker is here! The advantage of selecting Irish keynote speaker Conor Cunneen for your next conference is that he is very much alive, has won numerous awards recognizing his ability as a humorous keynote speaker including Chicago Humorous Speaker of the Year for a speech on Customer Service in San Quentin Jail.

This Chicago based Irish keynote speaker’s presentations on Vision, Attitude, Baaad Business Poetry! and The Brand Experience have Energized, Educated and Entertained audience from Harley-Davidson to Helsinki, from Memphis to Malaga and many places in between.

Go on – Provide your event with a Top o’ the Morning Feeling by contacting Conor Cunneen. You will appreciate why testimonials include:

“In my close to thirty years of association work, I have never seen a speaker as well received as you.”  Incentive Marketing Association 

And now – at last - some words from a wonderful motivational humorist. 

Q&A with Chicago based Irish keynote speaker Conor Cunneen. One of this Chicago based humorous keynote speakers inspirations is Mark Twain, whom Conor suggests was the first (and probably greatest) humorous keynote speaker. We asked Conor a few questions about this funny keynote speaker.

Q: You often comment that one of the reasons why Clemens was such a wonderful and inspirational humorous keynote speaker was because he worked really hard at his craft.

Q: Did he truly appreciate the importance of humor in speechmaking?

A: Most definitely. One of his most famous lines is "Against the assault of laughter, nothing can stand." He knew humor worked and he worked humor to get his messages across.

Q: As a humorous keynote speaker on Marketing, Branding, Foodservice, Cancer and other topics, have you learned from the first great humorous keynote speaker.

A: I think I will never stop learning from this man even though he has long since passed away. He was not afraid to use exaggeration. He would smile I think at how ridiculously often you will find in this website, references to funny, inspirational humorous keynote speaker or inspirational, funny, motivational, humorous keynote business speaker on Communication, Cancer, Foodservice and other topics. I think he would see the irony that for a serious search engine to find a website, you often have to use a ludicrous level of hyperbole.

Q: What else have you learned from the great man?

A: Pause. Clemens wrote that while the correct word is important, ‘nothing is as important as the perfectly timed pause." Pausing is difficult. It takes confidence. I have no problem holding a pause as a business keynote speaker for five, six, seven seconds now because I am confident in my material and my presentation.

Q: He was also a master at ironic humor.

A: He was indeed. In this speech on Theoretical Morals, (he actually spoke a number of times on morals, he says, "As by the fires of experience, so by commission of crime, you learn real morals. Commit all the crimes, familiarize yourself with all sins, take them in rotation (there are only two or three thousand of them), stick to it, commit two or three every day, and by-and-by you will be proof against them. When you are through you will be proof against all sins and morally perfect. You will be vaccinated against every possible commission of them. This is the only way." Truly this man who was the first great inspirational humorous keynote speaker was a genius.

ENJOY THE SPEECH

THEORETICAL MORALS

The New Vagabonds Club of London, made up of the leading

younger literary men of the day, gave a dinner in honor of Mr.

and Mrs. Clemens, July 8, 1899.

It has always been difficult--leave that word difficult--not exceedingly

difficult, but just difficult, nothing more than that, not the slightest

shade to add to that--just difficult--to respond properly, in the right

phraseology, when compliments are paid to me; but it is more than

difficult when the compliments are paid to a better than I--my wife.

And while I am not here to testify against myself--I can't be expected to

do so, a prisoner in your own country is not admitted to do so--as to

which member of the family wrote my books, I could say in general that

really I wrote the books myself. My wife puts the facts in, and they

make it respectable. My modesty won't suffer while compliments are being

paid to literature, and through literature to my family. I can't get

enough of them.

I am curiously situated to-night. It so rarely happens that I am

introduced by a humorist; I am generally introduced by a person of grave

walk and carriage. That makes the proper background of gravity for

brightness. I am going to alter to suit, and haply I may say some

humorous things.

When you start with a blaze of sunshine and upburst of humor, when you

begin with that, the proper office of humor is to reflect, to put you

into that pensive mood of deep thought, to make you think of your sins,

if you wish half an hour to fly. Humor makes me reflect now to-night, it

sets the thinking machinery in motion. Always, when I am thinking, there

come suggestions of what I am, and what we all are, and what we are

coming to. A sermon comes from my lips always when I listen to a

humorous speech.

I seize the opportunity to throw away frivolities, to say something to

plant the seed, and make all better than when I came. In Mr. Grossmith's

remarks there was a subtle something suggesting my favorite theory of the

difference between theoretical morals and practical morals. I try to

instil practical morals in the place of theatrical--I mean theoretical;

but as an addendum--an annex--something added to theoretical morals.

When your chairman said it was the first time he had ever taken the

chair, he did not mean that he had not taken lots of other things; he

attended my first lecture and took notes. This indicated the man's

disposition. There was nothing else flying round, so he took notes; he

would have taken anything he could get.

I can bring a moral to bear here which shows the difference between

theoretical morals and practical morals. Theoretical morals are the sort

you get on your mother's knee, in good books, and from the pulpit. You

gather them in your head, and not in your heart; they are theory without

practice. Without the assistance of practice to perfect them, it is

difficult to teach a child to "be honest, don't steal."

I will teach you how it should be done, lead you into temptation, teach

you how to steal, so that you may recognize when you have stolen and feel

the proper pangs. It is no good going round and bragging you have never

taken the chair.

As by the fires of experience, so by commission of crime, you learn real

morals. Commit all the crimes, familiarize yourself with all sins, take

them in rotation (there are only two or three thousand of them), stick to

it, commit two or three every day, and by-and-by you will be proof

against them. When you are through you will be proof against all sins

and morally perfect. You will be vaccinated against every possible

commission of them. This is the only way.

I will read you a written statement upon the subject that I wrote three

years ago to read to the Sabbath-schools. [Here the lecturer turned his

pockets out, but without success.] No! I have left it at home. Still,

it was a mere statement of fact, illustrating the value of practical

morals produced by the commission of crime.

It was in my boyhood just a statement of fact, reading is only more

formal, merely facts, merely pathetic facts, which I can state so as to

be understood. It relates to the first time I ever stole a watermelon;

that is, I think it was the first time; anyway, it was right along there

somewhere.

I stole it out of a farmer's wagon while he was waiting on another

customer. "Stole" is a harsh term. I withdrew--I retired that

watermelon. I carried it to a secluded corner of a lumber-yard. I broke

it open. It was green--the greenest watermelon raised in the valley that

year.

The minute I saw it was green I was sorry, and began to reflect

--reflection is the beginning of reform. If you don't reflect when you

commit a crime then that crime is of no use; it might just as well have

been committed by some one else: You must reflect or the value is lost;

you are not vaccinated against committing it again.

I began to reflect. I said to myself: "What ought a boy to do who has

stolen a green watermelon? What would George Washington do, the father

of his country, the only American who could not tell a lie? What would

he do? There is only one right, high, noble thing for any boy to do who

has stolen a watermelon of that class he must make restitution; he must

restore that stolen property to its rightful owner." I said I would do

it when I made that good resolution. I felt it to be a noble, uplifting

obligation. I rose up spiritually stronger and refreshed. I carried

that watermelon back--what was left of it--and restored it to the farmer,

and made him give me a ripe one in its place.

Now you see that this constant impact of crime upon crime protects you

against further commission of crime. It builds you up. A man can't

become morally perfect by stealing one or a thousand green watermelons,

but every little helps.

I was at a great school yesterday (St. Paul's), where for four hundred

years they have been busy with brains, and building up England by

producing Pepys, Miltons, and Marlboroughs. Six hundred boys left to

nothing in the world but theoretical morality. I wanted to become the

professor of practical morality, but the high master was away, so I

suppose I shall have to go on making my living the same old way--by

adding practical to theoretical morality.

What are the glory that was Greece, the grandeur that was Rome, compared

to the glory and grandeur and majesty of a perfected morality such as you

see before you?

The New Vagabonds are old vagabonds (undergoing the old sort of reform).

You drank my health; I hope I have not been unuseful. Take this system

of morality to your hearts. Take it home to your neighbors and your

graves, and I hope that it will be a long time before you arrive there.