Book Reviews: One L.

University of Baltimore Law Review Volume 7 Issue 2 Spring 1978 Article 9 1978 Book Reviews: One L. John Bennett Sinclair University of Baltimore School of Law Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.law.ubalt.edu/ublr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Sinclair, John Bennett (1978) "Book Reviews: One L.," University of Baltimore Law Review: Vol. 7: Iss. 2, Article 9. Available at: http://scholarworks.law.ubalt.edu/ublr/vol7/iss2/9 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@University of Baltimore School of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in University of Baltimore Law Review by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@University of Baltimore School of Law. For more information, please contact . BOOK REVIEWS ONE L. By Scott Turow.* G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, New York. 1977. Pp. 300. $8.95. And thus it is during the first year that many law students come to feel, sometimes with deep regret, that they are becoming persons strangely different from the ones who arrived at law school in the fall.I From the many horror stories that law students relate, one might be led to believe that the Inquisition is alive and well in today's law schools. Though not quite as terrifying as the rack and the screw, law school is, for many persons, the most trying period of their lives. And yet, somehow, law students usually still manage to find a way to laugh at it all. Scott Turow captures both the humor and the turmoil of the law school experience in his intriguing book One L. One L is an account of Turow's life as a first year law student (a 1L) at the Harvard Law School. It is written in the form of a journal, and, while nonfiction, names and personalities have been altered in certain cases to preserve privacy. At age twenty-six, married, and armed with a 749 LSAT score, Turow leaves his position as a lecturer in creative writing at Stanford and enters the Harvard Law School in the fall of 1975. His reasons for going to law school are not well-defined. He simply finds himself fascinated by the extent to which the law influences our daily lives, and does not want this interest in the law to go unfulfilled. Turow selects Harvard primarily for its prestige, mystery and to "meet his enemy." Meeting one's "enemy" means coming to grips with one's own fears, anxieties and shortcomings. As Turow and most law students find, law school has a peculiar way of bringing out the worst in people. Throughout his first year, Turow continuously meets his enemy and is disturbed with what he finds. Turow encounters a variety of professors in his first year. His nemesis, however, is Rudolph Perini, the renowned Contracts professor who runs his classroom like the Star Chamber. Perini is reminiscent of the ominous Professor Kingsfield in The Paper Chase. 2 Students from a number of impressive backgrounds are quickly humbled into submission by Perini, who grills them relentlessly on the intricacies of contract law. Being caught unprepared when called on is the ultimate transgression in Perini's classroom. Anyone who has been through law school remembers those random invasions of his privacy. A scene in One L in which a student is found unprepared shows, however, that Perini does have a human side. Another humorous touch is the admirable Harvard tradition of the class hissing the professor when he mistreats a student. This weapon, though, is used only sparingly against Perini. * A 3L, Harvard Law School. 1. S. TUROW, ONE L 10 (1977). 2. J. OSBORN, THE PAPER CHASE (1971). 410 Baltimore Law Review [Vol. 7 Learning to think like a lawyer is a painful process for Turow and his fellow lUI. Turow finds that reading his first case is "something like stirring concrete with my eyelashes."3 At first, he shuns Gilbert's and other study aids, considering their use as bordering on plagiarism. Mter his first Contracts class, however, Turow buys a hornbook, which is soon followed by various Gilbert's and canned briefs. No longer is he concerned about "intellectual integrity;" he now wants to understand. He even becomes known as the "Rainbow Kid" for taking class notes in different-colored inks. The law begins to permeate Turow's personal life. Law school strains his marriage as he finds little time to spend with his wife and as he talks of little else but law. At social gatherings with other law students, law school dominates the conversation. Turow and his fellow classmates find their vocabularies changing as little bits of legalese enter their conversations. "Quaere if that position can be supported?" and "Let me add a caveat."4 After ordering a hamburger in a restaurant, Turow asks himself whether a contract has been formed and what damages, if any, the restaurant would be entitled to if he reneges before eating the hamburger. In short, Turow and the other lLs quickly find their lives consumed in learning to love the law. Turow becomes dismayed at the increasingly competitive atmosphere in the classroom. Students who volunteer to speak too often are frequently regarded with jealous disdain by their classmates. Turow limits the number of times he speaks in class to avoid being looked down upon. Then the lLs begin more and more to raise their hands in class, seemingly trying to outdo one another. Turow blames this on the Socratic method, which he believes encourages pitting one student against another, as classroom performance is the only indicium by which first semester students can measure how they stand. As all Harvard law students have superior academic backgrounds, the competition heightens as the first semester progresses. Turow pokes fun at the "brownnosers," "shouters," and "people who resolved not to miss a single faculty word when uttered," who would engage in a "cattle show" around the professors after class. 5 And yet, Turow himself gets caught up in trying to outdo his fellow classmates. He, too, feels the need to shine when called upon and also desperately wants good grades. The lUI object to their being indoctrinated into thinking like lawyers. Many feel that their personal beliefs and feelings are being ridiculed and scuttled in the process. Turow complains that thinking like a lawyer involves a suspicious and distrustful view of the world. As a law student, you are taught never to take a statement at face 3. S. TUROW, ONE L 31 (1977). 4. Id. at 66. 5. Id. at 136. 1978] Book Reviews 411 value. You question everything. Turow and the lLs begin wondering what part, if any, morals and personal values play in the law. Turow also discusses the scramble at Harvard for jobs. Most of the lLs, upon entering Harvard, claim that they want to work for public interest law firms and would not work for the big corporate law firms. Then the temptations set in. One Harvard student splits his summer after his second year by working six weeks in a Legal Aid office on an Indian reservation, and then working six weeks with a corporate firm. Lega (...truncated)