Martin Luther King, the Jewelry Genius, and the Art of Public Speaking (Classic)
Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford
Pushkin Industries
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 19 January 2024
⏱️ 76 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
One speechmaker inspired millions with his words, the other utterly destroyed his own multi-million-dollar business with just a few phrases.
Civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr (played by Jeffrey Wright of American Fiction, Westworld and The Hunger Games) and jewelry store owner Gerald Ratner offer a stark contrast on when you should stick to the script - and when you should take a risk.
We're taking a short rest on Cautionary Tales this January. We'll be back again in February, with a treasure chest of gripping, hair-raising tales for your ears. While you wait, we wanted to share some classic episodes from the Cautionary Vault - this is one of our favorites.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Pushkin. |
| 0:09.0 | A middle-aged electrician is murdered in a quiet Amsterdam suburb. The killing leads investigators into a web of drugs, money laundering and state-sponsored assassinations that stretches from Dublin to Dubai. |
| 0:21.0 | At the centre is a cocaine super cartel and a hidden economic war |
| 0:25.6 | between democracies and dictatorships. It's the new season of the hit podcast from the Financial Times and Pushkin Industries. |
| 0:33.0 | Hot Money, the New Narcos. |
| 0:34.0 | Listen to Hot Money, the New Narcos |
| 0:36.0 | on the I Heart Radio app, |
| 0:38.0 | or wherever you get your podcasts. This week was Martin Luther King Junior Day, which reminded me that one of my favorite ever episodes of cautionary tales was about Martin Luther King |
| 0:55.6 | Jr's most famous speech and about an infamous speech given by a very different character, Gerald Ratner. |
| 1:04.0 | A confession. I am a public speaking nerd. |
| 1:09.0 | I competed in international debate competitions at school |
| 1:12.0 | and once had a career plan to write books about public speaking. |
| 1:15.6 | I find the art of public speaking, fascinating and much misunderstood. |
| 1:20.6 | And the more I looked into the story of these two speeches, each of which defined a man's career, |
| 1:27.0 | the more I thought to myself, we're thinking about this all wrong. We have a marvelous slate of cautionary tales coming in |
| 1:36.5 | 2024, but I hope you'll forgive me if I and the cautionary tales team take a short rest to recharge our batteries. |
| 1:45.0 | We will be back with new episodes in February but until then here is another chance |
| 1:51.3 | to hear the astonishing talents of Jeffrey Wright in Martin Luther King Jr. |
| 1:57.5 | The Jewelry Genius and the art of public speaking. |
| 2:07.0 | One late summer day in 1963, thousands upon thousands of people gathered on the mall in Washington, D.C. |
| 2:19.0 | They had come to America's capital for jobs and freedom, to show the Kennedy administration |
| 2:26.4 | that civil rights legislation must be pushed through Congress, and to hear the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr. speak. |
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