Preface

• Author: Neil Guthrie
• Pages: 13-15

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xiii

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This book began out of frustration.

Frustration at the turgid, pedantic, Latin-f‌illed, jargon-ridden,

misspelt, ungrammatical, and inelegant writing that issues from the

pens and keyboards of lawyers, law students, and those who come

within their orbit (assistants can have an unfortunate tendency to

replicate the bad habits of those they work with).

My working title was Please Don’t Write Like a Lawyer, but my

publisher counselled against using that, in case it alienated the

book’s main audience. It nevertheless provides an accurate insight

into my motivation and method.

Why is legal writing so bad? People come to the profession from

various academic and other backgrounds, and early on they feel as

though they have been initiated into not only a mode of reasoning but

also of writing: the art — or mystery perhaps — of law is attended

by its terms of art. These are a hodge-podge of words, phrases, and

habits of expression that have accreted over the centuries, mixing

Law French with Latin, the English of the early modern period,

memorable phrases from the case law, and def‌ined terms from stat-

utes. Fluency with the lingo is seen, especially in law school and the

early years of practice, as a proxy for knowledge of the law itself

(whether this is true or not). Being a generally conservative and cau-

tious bunch, lawyers are reluctant to change any wording they have

learned or which practice has sanctioned, preferring the certainty of