Synopses & Reviews
Text extracted from opening pages of book: CHARLES DICKENS AS A LEGAL HISTORIAN PUBLISHED ON THE FUND ESTABLISHED IN MEMORY OF GANSON GOODYEAR DEPEW The Storrs Lectures The addresses contained in this book were de livered in the William L. Storrs Lecture Series, 1927, before the Law School of Yale University. Other titles in this series, published by the Yale University Press, are: The Reform of Legal Procedure, by Moorfield Storey. The Judiciary and the People, by Frederick N. Judson. Concerning Justice, by Lucilius A. Emery. Woman's Suffrage by Constitutional Amendment, by Henry St. George Tucker. The Nature of the Judicial Process, by Benjamin N. Cardozo. An Introduction to the Philosophy of Law, by Roscoe Pound. LONDON Humphrey Milford: Oxford University Press CHARLES DICKENS AS A LEGAL HISTORIAN By William S. Holdsworth K. C., D. CJL Hon. LLD. Vinerian Professor of Law at Oxford University Bencher of Lincoln's Inn' NEW HAVEN Yak University Press 1929' C'opyrtgkV, 1928, by Yale University Press Printed in the United States of America First published, September, 1928 Second printing, January, 1929 I wish to thank my wife and Professor Smalley-Baker, Barber Professor of Law in the University of Birmingham, for seeing these Lectures through the press during my absence in India. W. S. E. Oxford April 1928 Contents I. The Courts and the Dwellings of the Lawyers i II The Lawyers, Lawyers' Clerks, and Other Satellites of the Law 43 III. Bleak House and the Procedure of the Court of Chancery 79 IV. Pickwick and the Procedure of the Common Law 117 Index 151 Dickens as a
Synopsis
Many of Dickens's novels touch upon the law and lawyers, in some of them the law and lawyers play a considerable part, and in one of them, Bleak House, the legal atmosphere is all pervading. Dickens was born in 1812; and the dates of these novels range from 1835 to 1870; so that the law and the lawyers, which Dickens had observed and described, were the law and the lawyers of the first two-thirds of the nineteenth century. That is now a period which has passed into history, and is beginning to attract the attention of historians, legal and otherwise. In these lectures I intend to show you that the treatment by Dickens of various aspects of the law and the lawyers of his day, is a very valuable addition to our authorities, not only for that period, but also for earlier periods in our legal history. The time at which the scene of many of Dickens's novels is laid dates, in many cases, before the era of reform had begun; and, when he began to write, it had only just begun. Pickwick set out on his travels in 1827, and the book was written in 1836. At the time when Dickens wrote his later works the Legislature had begun, tentatively and cautiously, to make those reforms in the machinery of the law, and in the law itself, which were long overdue. But much still remained to be done. Bleak House was written in 1852-1853; and, though some of the abuses there described had been remedied, there was still much which needed reform. Hence in Dickens's descriptions of the courts, the lawyers, and the law of his day, we get an account of those many archaic survivals, which help us to understand earlier periods in the history of our law; we get an account of the way in which the curious mixture of ancient and modern rules, which made up the law of that time, were then worked and applied; and we get an account of the results which they produced. It is obvious that a series of pictures of this age of transition, painted by an exceptionally gifted observer, is of unique value to the legal historian.
Synopsis
Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.