Bon Vivant

Holiday plans are spoiled by a dose of reality.  

August is traditionally a time for holidaying, resting, recharging the batteries and cogitating. However, there is always something nagging in the background. Just as I was packing my suitcases with horrific shirts, brightly coloured towels and those dreadful swimming shorts, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that there was an uncompleted questionnaire lying on my study desk about the future of the Bar. 

Celebrating an independent judiciary.  

This week saw me chugging along by train out of Victoria to the southern confines of my circuit. I was covering, by part time judging as a Recorder, one of those inevitable periods in the life of a publicly funded Silk that actors call “resting” and we call “working on papers”. Unwisely, I travelled First Class. My efforts to balance a fi le on a Formica table the size of a postage stamp had nearly succeeded when an evil smelling creature boarded the train together with an emaciated whippet. Both stared at me. 

That is the trouble with Lord Mansfield: you don’t hear about the guy for decades and suddenly two of him turn up at once. First, the true version in the recent biography (reviewed on page 26) and now the fictional version in the film Belle, in which Tom Wilkinson plays the great Lord Chief Justice with his customary blend of authority and rough but genuine kindness.   

It centres round a short period in the life of his great-niece, Dido Belle Murray, the illegitimate daughter of his nephew and of a black slave and who was brought up as part of the family with his legitimate niece, Elizabeth. This being 2014, there is a warning that the film contains “a brief sexual assault and discrimination theme”, a warning indeed that 21st century sensibilities may conflict with 18th century reality. 

The Bar Chairman, Vice-Chairman and Vice Chairman-Elect with their favourite books for the summer.  

Summer is designed for cricket, and it is a truth universally acknowledged that the best book about cricket is Beyond a Boundary by CLR James. The book takes in race, class, colonialism and so much more, as befits the Leninist, Trinidadian nationalist author of the line: “What do they know of cricket, who only cricket know?” 

Zoe Saunders on how she makes the most of her time away from court and unwinds.  

As I was leaving court recently, one of the local district judges said to me: “I understand you’ve taken up some kind of extreme sport, sky diving or something.” As someone who is terrified of heights and not much of an extreme sports fan I had no idea what he was talking about; after some discussion of other extreme sports that I would never contemplate, I tentatively offered “Do you mean freediving, Judge?” To which he replied, “oh yes, that’s the one". 

There comes a time when each person must decide where loyalties lie.  

“No doubt he will pursue the case with the added bitterness of an old friend.” 

Oscar Wilde of Edward Carson QC, MP. 

David Wurtzel reviews PESTS, a play by Vivienne Frantzmann and commissioned by theatre company Clean Break, at the Royal Court, Jerwood Theatre. The play is now on tour.  

It was well worth reading the script of PESTS over dinner before seeing the show... 

It has always been my belief that victory is harder to manage than defeat. When human minds are focused on crisis, it may bring out the best outcome possible. Victory, however, is another story. Doubts enter minds. Factions arise. ‘What if?’ becomes the dominant question. The reason is simple: defeat is rarely total or permanent, hence the desire to rescue and reverse; and victory is neither complete nor forever, which ushers in the worries. These truisms were uppermost in my mind when I attended my college gaudy last week.  

Gaudies are held around every five years as a grand reunion party. Few people go to the early ones, because it is time to escape university and get on with life. A much larger group go to those held in their middle years: a combination of growing nostalgia and perhaps a wish to show friends and contemporaries the fruits of success. 

David Wurtzel reviews a fundraising performance of case excerpts, both real and fictional.  

Court 1 at the Central Criminal Court, which has seen enough drama in its time, was the suitable venue for ‘Trial and Error’, an evening of excerpts about cases both real and fictional which had taken place at the Old Bailey, some even in the very courtroom. It was devised by HH Judge Peter Rook QC and further scripted and directed by Anthony Arlidge QC, who also provided the narration as the ‘court clerk’. The two performances on 3 and 4 March were staged in aid of the Sheriffs’ and Recorder’s Fund which assists former offenders. Over £17,000 was raised. 

As a child I was given a short book written by the late Mr Justice Darling – a man who was known for his judicial wit, although his Spy pen-portrait bore the unkind legend “Judicial Lightweight”. I had high hopes of this book of legal gems. Alas, it was the dullest book I ever read with all his anecdotes, quips and aphorisms falling flat. It now lives in our lavatory for what my dear mama, when we were little, used to call “struggles”.  

Darling is not alone, however. With noble exceptions, the written anecdotes of lawyers are deeply dull. The reason is that we live in an oral tradition, whatever those civil practitioners and sillies who dreamt up the Criminal Procedural Rules think: a world where stories are told and retold in robing rooms, chambers and wine bars. A very great character in Silk when I was a young barrister, called Barry, despite it being none of his given names nor any recognised foreshortening of them, once paid me the honour of telling me the story I had told him six hours earlier about a case of mine but with Barry now in the title role – quite oblivious of the irony. The characters in these stories come to life because we knew them or know them still or, at the least, knew or know of them.