Product Description

A supremely cogent guide to good legal writing. Blumberg not only provides a sleek typology of the profession's most common literary sins. He explores the motivations behind them--such as deflecting blameworthy conduct with passive constructions, steering judges and juries with adverbiage, and casting hypnotic spells with double negatives. At once witty and exhilarating, The Seven Deadly Sins of Legal Writing will change the way lawyers do business.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #762203 in Books
• Published on: 2008-07-22
• Binding: Paperback
• 56 pages

Review
A remarkable and concise roadmap to more effective, intelligible and persuasive legal writing. An invaluable desktop resource. --Theodore B. Olson

Under penalty of disbarment this book should be read and understood by every lawyer, most of whom forget they, and the judges who read their miserable briefs, are human beings. --Gerry Spence

What The Seven Deadly Sins does is shake the complacency of the modern attorney with regard to his writing and then show it is possible to do better ... Can you spare an hour or so to become a better legal writer? Sins is a short, readable book written in clear, straightforward prose worthy of George Orwell. --New York Law Journal

About the Author
Theodore L. Blumberg, a graduate of Temple University School of Law, now practices entertainment law in Manhattan. He is a frequent contributor to The New York Law Journal, and a lecturer in the Fahringer seminars in legal writing, begun in 2003.

Customer Reviews

The Seven Deadly Sins of Legal Writing
As part of full disclosure, first, the author represented me in the past; second, I consider him a close, personal friend. The Seven Deadly Sins of Legal Writing is a nugget of gold in a field not known for humor, self-criticism, or brievity. Lawyers and "laity" will be rewarded by reading this book. It offers self-improvement to the former and understanding of the law's traditional mind set to the latter, who are or will be clients. What are the "seven deadly sins of legal writing"? They are passivity, abstraction, adverbiage, verbosity, redundancy, speaking footnotes, and negativity. In 51 pages, the author identifies, explains, and provides a remedy for each. He offers interesting historical notes such as legal documents are long because lawyers were orginally paid by the word. This would possibly explain the adoption of the passive voice as it requires more words. Examples of "legalese" are provided at the end for readers to edit and improve based upon the useful rules they have read. The appendix contains the mock article from Laurence Sternes's "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy" (circa 1760). It is "legalese" taken to extreme. Hopefully, reading this nearly incomprehensible legal tract will be a wake up call for lawyers to adopt clear, concise, precise, and active language in their future legal writings.

Excellent resource and not just for lawyers
This book was extremely useful. I'm not a lawyer but I work with lawyers and also run my own non-profit business. In very logical and concise terms, the book points out the common flaws in legal writing, many of which we have come to accept as the norm. Of particular interest was the anecdote that lawyers used to be paid by the word; hence, their historic longwindedness. That goes a long way in explaining why legal writing is usually and unnecessarily so dense and inpenetrable. I recommend this book for anyone who works in law or does a lot of business writing. It has helped make my own writing more succinct and persuasive.