Osler's Razor

As I have mentioned here before, a lot of my time over the last year has been spent putting together a new casebook for first year criminal law students called "Contemporary Criminal Law." I sent it off to West Publishing yesterday-- all 1026 pages of it-- and there was real satisfaction in pushing that "send" button.

Last week, I wrote about how this project pushed me towards a spiritual state of aloneness that I really hadn't given much thought to before.  Today I want to talk about another aspect of the project that was a surprise, and a good one.

The trick to writing a good casebook, in part, is excerpting good opinions that illustrate the point you are trying to make. One thing I discovered as I read thousands of court opinions was an incredible range of writing ability on the federal bench. There are some terrible writers, and some fantastic ones. Of course, much of the writing is done by 20-something law clerks (I was one) whose previous experience was editing long turgid law review articles. The influence of bad academic writing on bad judicial writing became clear pretty quickly, as did the fact that some judges really transcend that challenge. I returned to the same judges multiple times, because their work was wonderful.

Once you have spotted a good opinion, though, the challenge turns to chopping it up. You rarely can afford the space to include an entire opinion. I found myself time and again spending hours on a single opinion, trying to reduce it to its essence and the facts that made it compelling.

When I did that well (and sometimes I was better than others) it was like chiseling a gem to a shape that seems to create light. After a while, it came to feel like an art. As I chipped away words to find the shape of a tragedy (and all of criminal law is tragedy), it reminded me of the way my dad seems to draw a person onto the canvas out of the ether.

Jesus did talk a lot more about what we need to give up than what we need to keep. I have often thought of that only in terms of sacrifice and humility-- cutting away wealth and pride-- but there is something more as well.

Sometimes we must carve away to reveal truth-- the noise, the distractions, the negativity. There is a spiritual value in that, of course, and the season for it begins in just a few weeks. I love Advent. It is coming at just the right time this year.