law
 
         
   

Law or War?

Language is a very revelatory phenomenon.  It can provide a ground-shattering insight into even the most bleary-eyed, boredom-encrusted lawyer.  I am not referring to the dry and arid legal propositions that flounce out his/her mouth.  Rather, I am referring to the use of metaphor which paints a vivid picture of the activity that said lawyer would rather be doing.

The use of metaphors in law can be broken down into just two categories:  sport and war.  Even the most boring sections of the White Book can be illuminated by a flavour-enhancing metaphor, heavy with redolence, and pregnant with promise.  The basic message is “If I wasn’t a lawyer I would be a knight in shining armour fighting a glorious crusade, or a sporting star bathed in the popularity of an adoring crowd”.  Neither of course are true, so I’ll content myself with metaphor.

So there you have it.  At once, the rolling up of the most noble and glorious of arts (war) with one of the most boring modern pursuits (law).

Perhaps some illustrations would help to further this discussion, and to throw light on the deepest urges of the legal subconscious.  It seems only right to pull out an illustration from the war category:

“It’s an excellent point but I think we should keep our powder dry on that one, the better for a rear-guard attack later.  We should shadow box on a less important point to distract their attention.”

So there you have it.  At once, the rolling up of the most noble and glorious of arts (war) with one of the most boring modern pursuits (law). A seamless transition, that wouldn’t be gapingly incongruent if it wasn’t ridiculous, and so very, very commonplace. Perhaps the theft of the valiant metaphor reflects our general squeamishness, and lack of valiance in modern life. No longer the dripping-blood heroes of the tactical crusade, but the grey-faced grey-minded pedants of the Chancery bar.

It’s not that lawyers are genetically war-like people, descended from the ancient sabre-wielders, but rather that war is the most instantly gratifying metaphor.

And now for another one.  For some may still doubt the echoing prevalence of war:

“I’m pretty confident I can give bearish advice on this point, for the enemy really are fighting the wrong battles, and we’ll have them like a rat  in the corner.  I’ll be sabre-rattling in court.”

The decorous medals are all evoked, the accoutrements of war and the instruments of killing all brought into the legal advice chamber. It’s not that lawyers are genetically war-like people, descended from the ancient sabre-wielders, but rather that war is the most instantly gratifying metaphor. It injects an urgency, primacy and interest to an otherwise achingly dull occupation.  Well that’s war, what about sport?

Many lawyers are, indeed, often decent dabblers in sport.  So it seems that the theft of sporting language is not heinous, but the half-inching of the glamour is more interesting. It begins of course with the anodyne, “We’re not playing on a level playing field”. But it can develop in unknown, and unknowable, directions.  A decent legal point could indeed morph into “bowling a wrong-un”, or a well-substantiated argument could lyrically transform itself into “an all-rounder, victor ludorum”. Other metaphors for a purple passage in legal play include “setting the pace” and “dictating the play”.

I hesitate to conjure any further, for every lawyer has a rich vein of linguistic experience to draw on. But if language is a peacock, then the lawyer’s metaphor is the multi-coloured plume. It has all the linguistic markers of wanting to be somewhere else, perhaps in a far-off mercenary army arguing over the finer points of equity, blood dripping.  It reflects the delusionary insanity of those who are attracted to law as a war-like pursuit, and those who must be horribly mystified by its dusty conformity and crusty cretaceionism.  Or have I got it all wrong?  Have I clung onto language when I shouldn’t have?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   
Lawyers: Discuss