 Lawyers
and Poetry
It seems, on first impression, that lawyers and poets
must surely exist in different universes of thought and feeling,
product and practice. And for many lawyers and poet there may be
truth embodied in the crude impression that the law leads north
and poetry south; to follow the one path is to preclude the other.
Yet, lawyers write poetry, and poets practice law. Should we be
surprised to learn that lawyers, by training and craft, attuned
to the nuance and power of language, and to the clever deployment
of language, write poetry? We may have grown accustomed in this
era of John Grisham and Scott Turow to the idea of the lawyer as
novelist, but there is still some mystery, at times a sense of wonderment,
at the idea of a person both poet and lawyer.
Perhaps there is no reason to think so grandly of
our poets or so badly of our lawyers. The celebration of the one
and the damnation of the other becomes rather confused when we find
a man or woman embracing both. Perhaps we misunderstand our poets,
in the way we do lawyers, because we know so little of their practices,
their language, and their contribution to a literate society. Whatever
the relative merits and worth of lawyers and poets, we are fast
becoming a society which knows far more about its lawyers than about
its poets. (We know it to be the exceptional reader and person who
reads poetry, and claims to learn from it, to depend on it to hone
sensibilities and chart a path in the world.) With our great ignorance
(if not active disdain) of poetry, how can it continue to play a
part in our literary lives? What makes poetry, and thus the poet,
special, different, marginal, misunderstood, ignored?
We may find that the poet, like the lawyer, sees the
world in a nuanced way that demands it be addressed with a special
language, language that calls attention to itself and sets itself
apart by form, rhythm, and practice. Both poetry and law are acquired
taste, all the more surprising, to have such tastes acquired by
a single person.
What then can be said about lawyers who become poets, poets who
become lawyers? First things first. We begin by identifying this country's lawyer/poets.
Chronological Index
Alphabetical Index
State Index
Civil War
Misc. Index
Contemporary
Lawyer Poets [ A-L ]
Contemporary
Lawyer Poets [ M- Z ]
An Anthology of Poetry by Lawyers
Lawyer
Poets Around the World
Poetry Resources
Books By Lawyer/Poets We're Reading
News Archive
Strangers to Us All:
Lawyers and Poetry is based
on research conducted by Professor James R. Elkins, College
of Law, West Virginia University. The
site was first posted on Labor Day, September 2, 2001.
The website undergoes constant updating. Please
contact Professor Elkins
with criticisms or aberrant thoughts about this endeavor.
Suggestions for additions are particularly welcome as
is biographical information which can be be used on any
of the webpages.
© James R. Elkins
2001-2009
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"The principles of the poetic sentiment lie deep within the immortal nature of man, and have little necessary reference to the worldly circumstances which surround him."
—Edgar
A. Poe, "Griswold's American Poetry," 2
(5) The Boston Miscellany of Literature and Fashion
218 (Nov. 1, 1842)
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Lawyer|Poets|PublishingNews
2010
(News): The University of Iowa
Press announced in February the publication of a new anthology
of law-related poetry, Poetry of the Law: From Chaucer
to the Present, edited by David Kader and Michael
Stanford. [Press
Release] [An article by Michael Stanford on lawyer/poets
was published by the Legal Studies Forum in 2006.
See, Michael Stanford, The
Cyclopean Eye, The Courtly Game, Admissions Against Interest:
Five Modern American Lawyer Poets, 30 Legal Stud.
F. 9 (2006)]
2010
(Legal Studies Forum): The
first LSF issue for 2010 is devoted to the prose/verse
historical vignettes of John Sanford (1904-2003). [Life
and Work of John Sanford]
The second LSF for
2010 is contains poems by Michael Blumenthal, Margaret
Hoehn, Christopher Cessac, Richard Alan Bunch, Jesse Mountjoy,
L. Ward Abel, Warren Wolfson, Charles Reynard, Ann Tweedy,
Robert Nielsen, Megan Carpenter, Susan Ayres, Laurie Soranio,
Laura Chalar, Marķa Constanza Farfalla, Mercedes Araujo,
Mariella Nigro, John W. Teeter, Jr., John Charles Kleefeld,
Lou Faber, and Joan Blessing. The issue also includes
stories by Peter Haje, David Butler, Gaynell Galvin, Allan
B. Ecker, and Richard Bank.
2010 (Collections
of Poetry by Lawyers): Christopher
Cessac, Eros Among the Americans (Main Street Rag,
2010)[Main
Street Rag Publishing]; Monica Youn,
Ignatz (Four Way Books, 2010); Paul
Killebrew, Flowers (Canarium, 2010); Bessy Reyna,
Memorias de la amante infiel (Memories of the Unfaithful
Lover) (Libros de la Tribu, 2010); Rachel Contreni
Flynn, Tongue (Red Hen Press, 2010);
Ann Tweedy, Beleaguered
Oases (TcCreativePress, 2010); Rebecca Foust, All
That Gorgeous Pitiless Song (Many Mountain Moving
Press, 2010); Keith Ainsworth, The
Loyal Opposition (Open Books, 2010)
Best of 2010: Christopher
Cessac, Eros Among the Americans (Main Street
Rag, 2010)
2010 (Collections
of Poetry by Lawyers)(Forthcoming):
Dan Olivas, Crossing the Border (Ghost Road Press,
2010); Gregory Chaimov, Touchstones (Press 22,
2010); L. Ward Abel, American Bruise (Parallel
Press, 2010); Charles Douthat, Blue for Oceans
(New Haven Review Press, 2010)
2009 (Collections of Poetry by
Lawyers): Seth Abrahamson, The Surburban
Ecstasies (Ghost Road Press, 2009);
Keith Ainsworth, The Courage of Intimacy (Open
Books, 2009); Michael Blumenthal,
And ( BOA Editions, 2009) [cover];
Lee Robinson, Creed (Plainview Press, 2009)[Plainview
Press]; Robert Boliek, Barry Marks, et.al., Einstein
at the Odeon Café (Churn Dash Press, 2009);Andrew
Borene, Blood, Sweat & Fury (iUniverse, 2009);
Elizabeth
Coleman, The Saint of Lost Things (Word Temple
Press, 2009); Rachel Contreni Flynn, Haywire
(Bright Hill Press, 2009) [Bright
Hill Press]; Rebecca Foust, Mom's Canoe (Texas
Review Press, 2009) [book
cover]; William Keener, Gold Leaf on Granite
(Anabiosis Press, 2009); Greg McBride,
Back of the Envelope (Copperdome Press, 2009);
Paul Rice, Through Yesterday's Window (Finishing
Line Press, 2009); Jendi Reiter, Swallow (Amsterdam
Press, 2009) [order
information]; Jonathan Rothschild, The Last Clubhouse
Eulogy (Chax Press, 2009); Kit Thornton, Piltdown
Agonistees (publisher unknown)
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For an essay on lawyer poets,
see James R. Elkins, The Remnants of a Lost
& Forgotten Library: On Finding the Lawyer Poets,
30 Legal Stud. F. 1 (2006) [on-line
text]
Contact Professor Elkins.
[Website image (books-lamp-quill): Thomas W. Herringshaw (ed.), Poets and Poetry of Kansas (Chicago: American Publishers' Association, 1894)]
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