Law and Literature

The following essay is based on the talk "Law and Literature : Examining the Limited Legal Imagination in the Traditional Legal Canon," delivered at the Fourth Annual Mid-Atlantic People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference at Rutger University-Camden in February. The complete talk will be part of the conference proceedings that are forthcoming from Rutgers University Press According to Justice Frankfurter, "[t]he best way to prepare for the law is to come to the study of law as a well-read person." Why so? One answer may be that well-read lawyers will, on the whole, be able to argue more persuasively.