If you're figuring out how to memorize the Gettysburg Address, here's the good news first: it's short. The standard version is 272 words, 10 sentences, about two minutes out loud. The bad news is that it's short in a sneaky way. "Dedicate" or "dedicated" appears six times, "here" appears eight times, and the final sentence runs past 80 words. Most students who stumble on recitation day don't forget whole lines. They swap one "dedicated" for another and end up in the wrong place.
The plan below takes about a week at 15 to 20 minutes a day. It works just as well for a history class assignment, a speech contest or a Veterans Day program.
Get the Right Version Before You Start
Lincoln wrote out five copies of the speech, and they don't match exactly. The one carved into the wall of the Lincoln Memorial is the Bliss copy, and that's what nearly every teacher means. It's the last copy Lincoln wrote and the only one he signed and dated. If you learn from a random website, you might pick up the Nicolay or Hay draft instead, which differ by a few words and leave out "under God" entirely. Ask your teacher which text they'll grade against, print it, and don't learn from anything else.
See the Shape: Past, Present, Future
The speech has three paragraphs, and they follow time. The first sentence is about the past (our fathers founded a nation 87 years ago). The middle paragraph is about the present (we're in a war, standing on a battlefield, here to dedicate a cemetery). The last paragraph turns to the future (we can't really dedicate this ground, but we can dedicate ourselves to finishing the work).
Say that outline out loud before you memorize a single word: past, present, future. When you blank in the middle of a recitation, knowing which part of the timeline you're in is often enough to bring the next sentence back.
The 7 Day Plan
Each day you learn new sentences, then recite from the very first word through the new ones. Starting from the top every time means the opening gets the most practice, which is good, because a strong start calms your nerves for everything after it.
Day 1: Sentence 1 ("Four score and seven years ago...") and sentence 2 ("Now we are engaged in a great civil war..."). That's about 60 words, and the first sentence is the one everyone half knows already.
Day 2: Sentences 3 to 5, which finish the middle paragraph: battlefield, a final resting place, "altogether fitting and proper." These are short. Recite from the beginning through "that we should do this."
Day 3: Sentences 6 and 7. "But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow, this ground," then the brave men who "consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract."
Day 4: Sentences 8 and 9. "The world will little note, nor long remember..." and "It is for us the living, rather..." Sentence 9 and sentence 10 start almost the same way, so learn 9 well before you touch 10.
Day 5: Sentence 10, the long one. Split it into its five parts (more on that below) and learn one or two parts at a time.
Days 6 and 7: No new material. Recite the whole speech three times a day, once from your printout as a check and twice from memory. Write it out by hand once and compare it word by word.
To actually learn each new sentence, don't just reread it. Read it once, look away, and try to say it. Check, fix, try again. Pulling the words out of your head is what builds memory, and it's called active recall. In the Memorize app you paste the speech in and it hides more words each round, so by the end you're saying a sentence from an almost empty line.
Breaking Up the Last Sentence
Sentence 10 is where recitations fall apart. It looks like a wall of text, but Lincoln built it as a list of things "we" should do, and each item starts with "that." Learn it as five pieces:
- It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us
- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion
- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain
- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom
- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth
Count the "thats" on your fingers as you recite: one, two, three, four. If you know you're on finger three, you know "highly resolve" comes next. This is the same idea as the chunking method: a long string becomes a handful of pieces your brain can hold at once.
The Words Everyone Mixes Up
The same handful of mistakes show up in almost every shaky recitation. Watch for these:
Dedicate, consecrate, hallow. The order goes from ordinary to holy: you dedicate a building, consecrate a church, hallow sacred ground. If that doesn't stick, use the initials D, C, H.
"That that nation might live." Yes, two "thats" in a row. People drop one because it sounds like a typo. It isn't.
The two "dedicated here" lines. Sentence 9 says "to be dedicated here to the unfinished work," and sentence 10 flips it to "to be here dedicated to the great task." Unfinished work comes first, great task second. Say both lines back to back ten times until the flip feels natural.
Of, by, for. "Of the people, by the people, for the people." The prepositions go in alphabetical order, which is a cheap trick but it works.
"Little note, nor long remember." Not "little note or long remember." Graders who check word for word will mark it.
Most slips happen at the joins between sentences, not inside them. If you keep stalling after "fitting and proper that we should do this," drill that line together with "But, in a larger sense" until the handoff is automatic.
Only Have One Night?
It can be done in an evening, but plan on two to three hours and a review in the morning. Do the same sentence order, just compressed: the first paragraph and the middle paragraph in the first hour, sentences 6 to 9 in the second, the last sentence in the third. Take a ten minute break between each. Before bed, recite it once all the way through, even if it's messy, because sleep does a lot of the consolidation work for you. In the morning, recite it twice before you look at the text. The general approach in the one night speech guide covers the rest.
Practicing the Delivery
Once the words are solid, slow down. A good recitation takes about two minutes. Students who finish in 75 seconds are almost always the ones who drop words, because speed hides the little gaps. Pause at every period. Pause a beat longer at the end of each paragraph.
Record yourself on your phone and listen back while reading the printed text. You'll catch the small swaps you can't hear while speaking. Then recite it for someone who follows along on paper, like a parent, a friend or a classmate. Being watched shakes loose any part that only works when you're relaxed, and it's much better to find that out in your kitchen than in front of the class.
If you're competing rather than reciting for a grade, the accuracy rules can be strict. The way Poetry Out Loud students prepare (word perfect early, then weeks of performance practice) works for a famous speech too.
