WEBVTT

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Now when you sit down
to create your vision,

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it's one thing to be able to answer the
three questions that we've talked about.

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But you also have to think very carefully
about the language that you're going to

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use to communicate that vision.

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Over the past decade or so,
we've been doing a lot of research around

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the language that leaders use to
communicate visions to their employees,

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to people, in ways that will compel
those individuals to want to be part of

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the organization,
to want to be part of this team.

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And what I am going to share with
you right now is a simple framework,

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a simple checklist,

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around the language that you can use to
communicate a really compelling vision.

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The first in this checklist is to
refer to a set of fundamental values.

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Again, your answer to our third question,

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How must we act in order to be
successful?, really gets at these values.

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You want to refer to
those values when you're

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communicating your vision to your team.

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Refer to them, not necessarily explicitly,

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by calling out the value of x,
the value of y, the value of z.

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You can do that.

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But even more effective is to use stories,
anecdotes, metaphors or

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analogies as communication vehicles to
transfer the meaning of those values.

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It's one thing to say
that we value integrity.

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It's another thing to tell a story about
an employee who did, quote unquote,

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the right thing when nobody was watching,
if you will, the definition of integrity.

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So think very clearly and carefully about
what values do I wanna communicate, and

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then what stories would best
resonate with my employees.

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And what stories would resonate with my
employees may be completely different than

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the stories that resonate with yours.

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What anecdotes, what metaphors,
what analogies.

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You have to think very carefully about
what's going to resonate with my audience.

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You also want to use rhetorical questions,
much like I'm doing with you here,

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where I ask you questions that don't
necessarily have an answer to them, but

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that provoke thought.

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And that's the rhetorical question.

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You also wanna think carefully
about using three-part lists.

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If you pay attention to presidential
candidates, for example,

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in the United United States during
election season who are going around and

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sharing with American citizens
their vision for the country.

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If you pay careful attention to many
of them, not all, but many of them,

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you'll pick up on a theme or a trend, and
that is they start their speech with,

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Here are the three things
I'm going to tell you.

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Then they will go through and
tell you those three things at length.

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Then when they conclude they will
remind you of that three-part list.

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It's a very effective technique for

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enabling people to remember the message
that you're trying to communicate.

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So again, rhetorical questions
combined with a three-part list,

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very effective communication vehicle for
articulating your vision for

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your team to the people in that team,
your employees.

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You also want to outwardly
express moral conviction.

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And what I mean by moral conviction
here is, why does it matter?

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Here you want to go back to your
answer to the first question,

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Why do we do ultimately
what we do as a team?

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In some of our latest research,

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we've found that referring to
the beneficiaries of your work.

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Again, why do we do what we do?

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Who are we benefiting through our work?

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Referring to those beneficiaries
is hugely impactful.

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A colleague of mine and friend,
Adam Grant at Wharton Business School,

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has been doing a lot of
research on the motivational

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benefits of referring to these
beneficiaries of your work.

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And we will share with you some of that
research when we talk about motivation and

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what people value.

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But that work comes back to this notion
of expressing moral conviction about

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why we do what we do and
why does it matter.

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The more you can clearly communicate
to your audience that moral conviction,

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why we do what we do and why it's so
important, the more they will embrace and

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get behind that vision that
you're trying to communicate.

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You also want to pay very careful
attention to the language you're using

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if you are the so-called leader.

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Whether your title is CEO or manager or

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otherwise, be very careful
not to use words like I.

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I want this, or I see our vision as being
whatever you ultimately see it as being.

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Instead of I language or me language,

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what you want to do is use what
we call inclusive language.

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We, our, our team, we as a collective
are going to accomplish and be successful.

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The more you can use inclusive language,
the more your audience will feel

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part of the vision that you
ultimately are trying to create.

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They'll buy into it,
they'll get behind it,

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even if their ideas aren't the ones
that are ultimately supported.

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If you go back to Steve Jobs
in the 1997 video,

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he explicitly states it's not as if all
of your ideas are gonna be supported.

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But what he does is uses inclusive
language to get them on board

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with the vision such that even if their
idea is not the one that's accepted,

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ultimately they understand why and they're
part of something bigger than themselves.

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This inclusive, collective language.

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And then finally is you want to repeat.

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You want to repeat your
message multiple times.

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Any time you have an opportunity
to communicate to your team,

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this is an opportunity to reinforce
the vision that you have.

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And when you're communicating, make sure
that you're repeating the key message.

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So again, if we go back to
the Steve Jobs video, you'll remember

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language that he repeated multiple times,
getting back to the basics.

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I was not in that room that day, but

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I expect the people who walked out of that
room who were there and when they left,

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statements or phrases like getting back
to basics were the ones they remembered.

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Part of the reason they remember
that is because of the repetition.

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So now you have a checklist.

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So as you sit down to
create the vision and

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think about how you wanna communicate
that, use this checklist as a tool,

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a framework for creating the language
that you ultimately want to use.

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And what I'm gonna do now is share with
you a short video clip from a film.

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The main lead character in this film,

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Robin Williams, one of the great
comedians of our time, if you will.

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The film is Dead Poets Society.

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A little context on the film.

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Robin Williams is a new teacher.

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He's a English poetry,
literature teacher in an all-boys,

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very conservative private school.

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In this school, the boys are taught from
a very early age, from the headmaster,

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their parents and so on,
that career pursuits that are worth their

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attention and their talents
include medicine, law, business.

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Poetry is probably the furthest
thing from their minds.

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Yet he is a new teacher in this
school responsible for engaging

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these students in a shared collective
activity, which is to learn about poetry.

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Remember, he's new, they all know
each other, and the video clip

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that I'm going to share with you is
his second interaction with the class.

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In the first interaction he has with the
class, he takes them out into the hallway,

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shares with them the trophies that

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prior students at the school have won and
all of the accolades.

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And he talks about the opportunity
that they have before them to really

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seize the day.

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The famous quote, carpe diem from
the movie, seize the day, and

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really the opportunity for these students
to do something special in their lives.

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But it's really in the second
interaction that he begins to

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communicate his vision for these students.

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And what I'd like you to do
is watch the video clip for

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a few minutes, and I want you to
have the checklist beside you.

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And I want you to pay attention to
how he uses the room, uses language.

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And see if you can take a count of
the devices from that checklist that

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Robin Williams uses to communicate
his vision to this team or

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this class of boys at this all private,
extremely conservative,

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school where poetry is not exactly
at the top of their priority list.

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>> Gentlemen, open your texts
to page 21 of the introduction.

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Mr. Perry,

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will you read the opening paragraph with
the preface entitled Understanding Poetry?

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>> Understanding Poetry by Dr.
J Evans Pritchard, Ph.D.

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To fully understand poetry,
we must first be fluent with its meter,

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rhyme and figures of speech.

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Then ask two questions.

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One, how artfully has the objective
of the poem been rendered?

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And two, how important is that objective?

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Question one rates the poem's perfection.

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Question two rates its importance.

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And once these questions
have been answered,

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determining the poem's greatness
becomes a relatively simple matter.

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If the poem's score for perfection is
plotted on the horizontal of a graph and

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its importance is plotted on the vertical,

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then calculating the total area of the
poem yields the measure of its greatness.

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A sonnet by Byron might score
high on the vertical but

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only average on the horizontal.

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A Shakespearean sonnet, on the other hand,

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would score high both horizontally and
vertically,

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yielding a massive total area, thereby
revealing the poem to be truly great.

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As you proceed through the poetry in
this book, practice this rating method.

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As your ability to evaluate
poems in this manner grows, so

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will your enjoyment and
understanding of poetry.

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>> Excrement.

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That's what I think of Mr.
J Evans Pritchard.

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We're not laying pipe.

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We're talking about poetry.

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How can you describe poetry
like American Bandstand?

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Well, I like Byron, I give him a 42,
but I can't dance to it.

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>> [LAUGH]
>> Now I want you to rip out that page.

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Go on, rip out the entire page.

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You heard me, rip it out.

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Rip it out!

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Go on, rip it out.

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[SOUND]
>> Oh.

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>> Thank you, Mr. Dalton.

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Gentlemen, tell you what.

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Don't just tear out that page.

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Tear out the entire introduction.

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I want it gone, history,
leave nothing of it.

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Rip it out, rip!

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[SOUND] Be gone, J Evans Pritchard, Ph.D.

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Rip, shred, tear, rip it out!

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I want to hear nothing but
ripping of Mr. Pritchard.

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We'll perforate it, put it on a roll.

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It's not the Bible,
you're not gonna go to hell for this.

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>> [LAUGH]
>> Go on, make a clean tear.

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I want nothing left of it.

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>> We shouldn't be doing this.

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>> Rip it.

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>> Rip it out, rip!

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[NOISE]

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[CROSSTALK]

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>> Rip it out.

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>> What the hell is going on here?

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>> I don't hear enough rip.

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>> Mr. Keating.

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>> Mr. McAllister.

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>> I'm sorry, I didn't know you were here.

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>> I am.

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>> So you are.

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Excuse me.

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>> Keep ripping, gentlemen!

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This is a battle, a war, and the
casualties could be your hearts and souls.

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Thank you, Mr. Dalton.

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Armies of academics going forward,
measuring poetry.

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No, we will not have that here.

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No more of Mr. J Evans Pritchard.

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Now in my class, you will learn
to think for yourselves again.

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You will learn to savor words and
language.

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No matter what anybody tells you,
words and ideas can change the world.

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I see that look in Mr.
Pitt's eye, like 19th century literature

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has nothing to do with going to business
school or medical school, right?

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Maybe.

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Mr. Hopkins, you may agree with him,
thinking yes,

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we should simply study our Mr. Pritchard
and learn our rhyme and meter and

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go quietly about the business
of achieving other ambitions.

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I have a little secret for you, huddle up.

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Huddle up!

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We don't read and
write poetry because it's cute.

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We read and write poetry because
we are members of the human race,

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and the human race is filled with passion.

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Medicine, law, business, engineering,
these are noble pursuits and

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necessary to sustain life.

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But poetry, beauty, romance, love,

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these are what we stay alive for.

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To quote from Whitman, oh me,
oh life, of the questions of

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these recurring,
of the endless trains of the faithless,

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of cities filled with the foolish,
what good amid these, oh me, oh life?

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Answer, that you are here,
that life exists and identity.

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That the powerful play goes on and
you may contribute a verse.

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That the powerful play goes on and
you may contribute a verse.

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What will your verse be?