Whether rousing activists, energizing voters, eulogizing the dead, inspiring graduates—or simply entertaining party guests (hello, Mark Twain!)—the seventy-five speeches featured in this "eclectic collection of orations deserving of a wider audience" are not to be missed. Selections include Malala Yousafzai's 2013 speech to the United Nations youth assembly about the importance of education, Ryan White's 1988 testimony on living with AIDS, Sojourner Truth's blistering 1851 "the women are coming up" monologue, Margaret Sanger's 1921 speech for the first American Birth Control Conference, Albert Einstein's 1940 World's Fair address honoring the scientific contributions of "immigrants, Negroes and American Indians," even Socrates's final speech (in 399 B.C.), delivered just before his execution by poison. Speeches of Note is essential reading for historians, writers, and anyone else moved by the awesome power of language.