How we cite our quotes: All quotations are from The King's Speech.
Quote #1
ELIZABETH: Johnson was used during the Great War when the Navy didn't want the enemy to know "he" was aboard.
In World War One, the English royal family would often travel on ships. But they used the codename "Johnson" instead of "King" in case the enemy intercepted one of their messages. After all, you don't want to put a huge target on your ship that says, "The Prince is on board."
Quote #2
CHURCHILL: There were those that worried where he would stand when war with Germany comes.
Winston Churchill tells Bertie that it's a good thing that his brother David left the throne to marry Wallis Simpson. People in England have long felt uncomfortable with the sympathy that David felt for Hitler and the fascists.
Quote #3
CHURCHILL: Indeed we are, Sir. Prime Minister Baldwin may deny this, but Hitler's intent is crystal clear. War with Germany will come, and we will need a King behind whom we can all stand united.
No one else seems to see it, but Churchill has known for a long time that it will be impossible to avoid war with Germany. And that's why it's more important than ever to have a good king who can unite the country against the enemy.
Quote #4
LOGUE: When the Great War came, our boys were pouring back from the front, shell-shocked and unable to speak.
Logue never got his training in speech therapy from a fancy school. Everything he knows he learned by trying to help soldiers who came back from World War One shell-shocked and unable to speak.
Quote #5
LOGUE: All I know I know by experience, and that war was some experience.
In his mind, Logue is an expert in speech therapy because he has more experience than anyone else in his field. He has seen the worst of the worst and he knows for certain that speech defects are based on psychological problems, not just physiological issues with a person's mouth.
Quote #6
BERTIE: Fraud! With war looming, you've saddled this nation with a voiceless king.
Bertie feels cheated when he finds out that Lionel Logue has no credentials as a speech therapist. The stakes are too high for his therapy to fail because war is coming and the country might not survive if it doesn't have a strong leader.
Quote #7
BALDWIN: I have found it impossible to believe that there is any man in the world so lacking in moral feeling as Hitler, but the world might be hurled for a second time into the abyss of destructive war.
Prime Minster Baldwin's biggest mistake was underestimating the evil of Adolph Hitler.
Quote #8
BERTIE: I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany.
The day finally comes when Bertie has to announce that England has gone to war with Germany. Memories of World War One are still fresh in many people's eyes, and no one is happy about what's happening. But to be fair, the reasons for getting into World War Two (like stopping Hitler) are pretty good ones.
Quote #9
BERTIE: This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German Government a final note stating that unless we heard from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us.
Bertie's government made things clear to Germany. Get out of Poland or we'll be at war. Germany hasn't gotten out of Poland, so that's that.
Quote #10
BERTIE: If I am to be king... where is my power? May I form a government, levy a tax or declare a war? No! Yet I am the seat of all authority.
Bertie has troubled understanding how he's so powerful when it's his government that makes all the decisions. After all, he's not the one to declare war with Germany. He's just the one who needs to stand up and rally his people for the cause.