Hi, Jerry:
A couple more thoughts:
1. You need to take a look at this classic law student text: James B.
White, /The Legal Imagination: Studies in the Nature of Legal Thought
and Expression/ (Little, Brown & Co. 1973), which includes a section on
the judge as poet. He might have put out later editions, but that was
the one I retained from law school.
2. Several of the leading proponents of the newly developing field of
cognitive linguistics maintain that everyday speech, prose, and poetry
are actually on a continuum and that we all use the same devices when
thinking imaginatively. Several works of Mark Turner, starting with
/More Than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor/ (University of
Chicago Press 1989), which he wrote with George Lakoff, and including
/Cognitive Dimensions of Social Science: The Way We Think About
Politics, Economics, Law, and Society/ (Oxford University Press 2001),
explore this theme. A good introduction to the application of cognitive
linguistics to law, or at least to judicial opinions, is Steven Winter,
/A Clearing in the Forest: Law, Life and Mind/ (University of Chicago
Press 2001).
All the best,
Charley
Charles R. Dyer
Charles R. Dyer Consulting
808 East Maple Street
Bellingham, WA 98225-5225
360-738-6439
fax 360-738-6439 (call first)
mobile 360-483-9446
charlesrdyer@clearwire.net
www.charlesrdyer.com
Jerry_Stephens@ca10.uscourts.gov wrote:
>
> Nate Oman posted an entry about poetry on the blog "Concurring
> Opinion" yesterday. Oman wrote that lawers and judges frequently write
> of the "poetry of the law." He identified one specific piece written
> by Edgar Lee Masters in his /Spoon River Anthology/. Oman also noted
> that Masters did practice law in Chicago and did include a number of
> legal references in the anthology.
>
> Here's the link:
> http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2007/11/the_poetry_of_t.html#more
>
>
> I am curious about this notion of the "poetry of the law." Can you
> help me identify any other poems with a law-related theme or subject
> matter?
>
> I will admit up front that I am much more attracted to poetry now that
> I'm older. But I am still somewhat poetry-challenged when I stray
> beyond the more widely known and appreciated poetry.
>
> Jerry E. Stephens
> U.S.Court of Appeals
> Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
>
> email: jerry_stephens@ca10.uscourts.gov
> personal: jstephens6@cox.net
> voice: (405) 609-5460
> fax: (405) 609-5461
> cell: (405) 834-1408
>
> "A lawyer is a person who writes a 10,000 word document and calls it a
> brief."
> --Franz Kafka
>
> "I may be wrong, but I'm never in doubt."
> --Marshall McLuhan
>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Dec 03 2007 - 09:57:05 PST