"A readable and enjoyable book of interest to the lay public,
litigators and aficionados of trials alike...well worth
reading."
-- "CBA Record"
"Delightful and insightful...He knows how to tell a story, and
he knows that facts depend on perceptions."
-- "ABA Journal"
"Lubet's ability to downplay advocacy techniques while
emphasizing the rich context of facts, story, and personalities is
superb"
--"Choice"
"A delightful and insightful book [that] entertains as it
instructs."
--"ABA Journal"
"This excellent set of essays, both scholarly and imaginative,
offers a rare bridge between the parallel universes of legal
scholarship and courtroom practice. There is no better guide to the
enterprise of storytelling in the law than Steve Lubet."
--Marianne Wesson, Professor of Law, University of Chicago
Lubet's Nothing But The Truth presents a novel and engaging
analysis of the role of storytelling in trial advocacy. The best
lawyers are storytellers, he explains, who take the raw and
disjointed observations of witnesses and transform them into
coherent and persuasive narratives.
Critics of the adversary system, of course, have little patience
for storytelling, regarding trial lawyers as flimflam artists who
use sly means and cunning rhetoric to befuddle witnesses and
bamboozle juries. Why not simply allow the witnesses to speak their
minds, without the distorting influence of lawyers' stratagems and
feints?
But Lubet demonstrates that the craft of lawyer storytelling is
a legitimate technique for determining the truth andnot at all
coincidentallyfor providing the best defense for the attorney's
client. Storytelling accomplishes three important purposes attrial.
It helps to establish a "theory of the case," which is a plausible
and reasonable explanation of the underlying events, presented in
the light most favorable to the attorney's client. Storytelling
also develops the "trial theme," which is the lawyer's way of
adding moral force to the desired outcome. Most importantly,
storytelling provides a coherent "story frame," which organizes all
of the events, transactions, and other surrounding facts into an
easily understandable narrative context.
As with all powerful tools, storytelling may be misused to ill
purposes. Therefore, as Lubet explains, lawyers do not have carte
blanche to tell whatever stories they choose. It is a creative
process to be sure, but every story must ultimately be based on
"nothing but the truth." There is no room for lying.
On the other hand, it is obvious that trial lawyers never tell
"the whole truth," since life and experience are boundless and
therefore not fully describable. No lawyer or court of law can ever
get at the whole truth, but the attorney who effectively employs
the techniques of storytelling will do the best job of sorting out
competing claims and facts, thereby helping the court arrive at a
decision that serves the goals of accuracy and justice.
To illustrate the various challenges, benefits, and complexities
of storytelling, Lubet elaborates the stories of six different
trials. Some of the cases are real, including John Brown and Wyatt
Earp, while some are fictional, including Atticus Finch and Liberty
Valance. In each chapter, the emphasis is on the narrative itself,
emphasizing the trial's rich context of facts and personalities.
The overall conclusion, as Lubet puts it, is that"purposive
storytelling provides a necessary dimension to our adversary system
of justice."
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