Storytelling for Lawyers

Chapter 1 - Introduction 1 I. Lawyers are Storytellers 1 II. Legal Arguments are Stories in Disguise 3 III. The Parts of a Story 4 IV. Movies and Closing Arguments 6 Chapter 2 - Plotting I: The Basics 11 I. What is Plot? 11 II. Plot Structure in Two Movies 28 Chapter 3 - Plotting II: Plot Structure in a Closing Argument to a Jury in a Complex Torts Case 44 I. The "Back Story" 47 II. Annotated Excerpts from Spence's Closing Argument on Behalf of Karen Silkwood 48 III. Concluding Observations 85 Chapter 4 - Character Lessons: Character, Character Development, and Characterization 110 I. Introduction: Why Emphasize Movie Characters in Legal Storytelling? 110 II. What is Character, and Why Is It Important to Legal Storytellers? 113 III. Flat and Round Characters and Static and Changing Characters-High Noon Revisited 119 IV. Techniques of Character Development and Characterization-Excerpts from Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life 131 Chapter 5 - Characters, Character Development, and Characterization in a Closing Argument to a Jury in a Complex Criminal Case 147 I. The "Back Story" 147 II. Excerpts from the Opening: Act I-"The Setup" and "Confrontation" 151 III. Concluding Observations 173 Chapter 6 - Style Matters: How to Use Voice, Point of View, Details and Images, Rhythms of Language, Scene and Summary, and Quotations and Transcripts in Effective Legal Storytelling 185 I. Back Story: Grading Law School Examinations 185 II. Preliminary Note: "Voice" and "Style" 188 III. Voice and Rhythm: "Staying on the Surface" 191 IV. The Use of Scene and Summary: "Showing and Telling" 201 V. Telling in Different Voices 208 VI. Perspective or Point of View 220 VII. Several Functions of Perspective: How Does Perspective (Point of View) Work, and What Work Does it Do? 225 VIII. Concluding Observations 245 Chapter 7 - A Sense of Place: Settings, Descriptions and Environments 252 I. Introduction 252 II. Dangerous Territory: Contrasting Settings Evoking Danger and Instability in Joan Didion's "The White Album" and the Judicial Opinion in a Rape Case 255 III. More Dangerous Places Where Bad Things Happen: Use of Physical Descriptions and Factual Details to Create Complex Environments in W.G. Sebald's The Emigrants and the Petitioners' Briefs in Two Coerced Confession Cases 266 IV. Settings and Environment as Villains and Villainy in the Mitigation Stories of Kathryn Harrison's While They Slept and the Petitioner's Brief in Eddings v. Oklahoma 283 V. Concluding Observations 298 Chapter 8 - Narrative Time: A Brief Exploration 302 I. Introduction 302 II. The Ordering of Discourse Time 305 III. Concluding Observations 325 Chapter 9 - Final Observations: Beginnings and Endings 330