56 pages • 1 hour read
Mark Logue , Peter ConradiThe King's Speech
Nonfiction | Biography | Adult | Published in 2010A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 10-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 10 Summary
Both the coronation and the radio broadcast are “a triumph” (132). Logue takes a much-needed vacation, and on his return, helps the King with his various speeches. The King’s workload is beginning to take a toll, and he appears “very drained” (133). Logue believes that “they are very foolish to overwork him” (133). Preparing for an address to Parliament, the heaviness of the crown becomes an issue though the speech is a success. In December, there is a rising expectation that the King will need to deliver a Christmas radio broadcast.
As they prepare, Logue begins to hear rumors that Princess Margaret, now seven-years-old, suffers from the same speech impediment as her father. He encourages the palace to release news footage of the Princess speaking normally so as to silence the rumor. On Christmas Day 1937, Logue catches a train to Norfolk to meet the King. The Royal Family give him a “hearty welcome” (137). After dinner, Logue and the King retire to the study to prepare for the broadcast.
The speech begins. The King begins too fast but then slows. After three minutes and twenty seconds, the speech is finished. Though there are a few errors, Logue congratulates the King. The family gathers to listen to the broadcast again. The Queen stops Logue and thanks him for everything he has done for her husband. Logue is “overcome with emotion” (140). He sits and talks with the King awhile, who then hands Logue a gift. A photograph of the royal family, a silver tobacco box, and a pair of gold cuff links. Logue cannot say much and the King thanks him. Then, they watch the children open their presents and play games.
Logue leaves to catch his train home. The King has arranged for a hamper to be placed on the train containing a Christmas dinner. Logue is collected at the station by Laurie and returns home to meet his own family and guests. Myrtle is not present, having returned to Australia to recover from a bout of ill health. There, she is treated as a celebrity. Unlike her husband, she has no compunction about discussing his work with the King. Logue collects all of the interviews and adds them to his scrapbook.
Chapter 11 Summary
While Myrtle is in Australia, Europe moves closer to war. Hitler annexes Czechoslovakia in 1938. Logue meets with the King while Neville Chamberlain meets with Hitler. They discuss the potential war, which the King hopes to avoid. Chamberlain arrives back from his meeting and declares “peace for our time.” Logue meets the King frequently over the coming months. They prepare for a trip to Canada and a meeting with the U.S. President, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Logue even provides the King’s staff with advice, being as he is “a colonial” (147).
During Logue’s frequent trips to the palace, he begins to see more of the royal family, including Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother. During one of the final practices, Logue and the King are interrupted by the Queen and the princesses. At the King’s encouragement, Logue tells the story of how as a boy he dived off a jetty and on to a shark. The princesses listen, “their eyes open wide and their hands clasped” (150).
The royal family sails to Canada, arriving a few days later than planned. Logue listens to the King’s speech over the radio and sends a telegram of congratulations. The trip to the United States is “the first time a reigning British sovereign had set foot on the country’s soil” (150-151). In Washington, 600,000 people gather to see the King. Roosevelt and the King are able to speak frankly about international affairs. The press speculates that Roosevelt (confined to a wheelchair) and the King (with his speech impediment) are drawn together by their shared disabilities. The trip concludes, a success for the country and for the “King’s own self-esteem” (152). Logue and the King meet upon the King’s return. The King chats affectionately about Roosevelt; they prepare for a speech to be delivered that afternoon. The speech is heralded by listeners and the press.
Chapter 12 Summary
In September 1939, the Second World War finally begins. The government re-organizes itself. The country has already been preparing for a seemingly inevitable war with Germany. Children are evacuated to the countryside; air defenses are built around cities. The Logue family prepares for the Blitz. Their long-time cook is from Bavaria, however, and she flees back to Germany. Logue writes in his diary about the relief of finally knowing where things stand and of “the universal desire […] to kill the Austrian house painter” (157). The air raids begin and even the royal family decamps into the basement bomb shelter.
London struggles to come to terms with the total blackout. Logue is to play an “important role” (159) in the war at the side of the King. On 3 September, he travels to the Palace. They prepare “a declaration of simple faith in simple believes” (159). Logue is “struck by the sadness in the King’s voice” (160). The King delivers his speech, broadcast across the Empire. Logue congratulates the King on his “first wartime speech” (161) but the King expects to have to do a lot more. The Queen asks Logue for help with a speech she will deliver “to the women” (161).
Over the coming days, rationing is introduced. The opening of Parliament shrinks in size and opulence, reflecting the “quiet solemnity of the occasion” (163) in contrast to Hitler’s pomp. A Christmas speech is also prepared and the King dreads delivering it. It is a great success, particularly a poem that is included at the end and is then printed in many places around the country.
Chapters 10-12 Analysis
Following his brother’s abdication, Bertie has to step into his father’s shoes. Though their relationship was strained in Bertie’s early years, adulthood (and in particular, marriage and his work with Logue) has changed this. He and his father had become close prior to his death, and now the scale of Bertie’s tasks become greater. Bertie demonstrates this through his choice of royal title. He becomes King George VI, following his father, King George V. In particular, the motif of the Christmas speech becomes one of the clearest examples of the trepidation he feels stepping into his father’s footsteps. The broadcast became one of his father’s signature traditions and is explicitly a task that the new King George will find difficult to perform. Thus, Bertie attempts to deliver a Christmas broadcast to satisfy a number of deeply symbolic functions. It demonstrates his ability to overcome his own flaw, and at the same time, is his way of commemorating his father’s legacy and exorcising the ill will that has hung over the royalty in the wake of his brother’s abdication. The speech is important, and its success demonstrates Bertie’s growth, constantly informed by his friendship with Logue.
With the world gripped in the events of the Second World War, the change in tone between the first speech the King broadcast to the Empire and his message on the eve of war is palpable. During the first broadcast, the dramatic tension stemmed from the newly-crowned King’s ability to overcome an internal, personal issue (namely, his stammer). With the horrors of another war becoming more evident, the dramatic tension now stems from an external issue (war). Both internal and external issues are threats to the delivery of the King’s speech, but on both occasions, the King and Logue work together to ensure success. Their friendship is now not only helping Bertie come to terms with his wretched self-confidence, but it is also helping an entire Empire fight a war.
