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Category Archives: Books

The Obstacle Course

January 17, 2009 – 11:30 pm

Sometimes, politics is like dodgems. I’ve just had to thread the pushbike through what is rapidly becoming the Broad Street obstacle course. This started with the usual bunch of Animal Libbers (attempting to disrupt a graduation), and was followed by a large and somewhat pushy Gaza/Palestine/Hamas protest. The Oxfordshire constabulary are fond of using mounted [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Law | Comments (5)

Rowling wins copyright case

September 10, 2008 – 10:20 am

J.K. Rowling has succeeded at first instance in her copyright infringement case against RDR publishers and Stephen Vander Ark for their proposed Harry Potter Lexicon. I have mentioned this case earlier. Obviously the trial judge managed to get his head around the plotlines which he initially described as “gibberish”, as the judgment shows quite a [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Intellectual property, Law, Popular culture | Comments (12)

Harry Krishna?

August 26, 2008 – 9:17 pm

I’m fascinated by the Harry Potter industry. We’ve already seen Warner Bros and J.K. Rowling take on a New York librarian and lexicon author for copyright infringement. Now they are taking on the might of Bollywood… The Indian movie is called Hari Puttar – A Comedy of Terrors. The Hollywood Reporter tells us:

The case is [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Intellectual property, Law, Media, Popular culture | Comments (27)

Distilling the fear

August 4, 2008 – 6:58 am

Illiberal, grumpy, explosive with the nationalist bombast but nonetheless truly great, Alexander Solzhenitsyn is dead. The author of one of the two great short novels I have ever read – One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich – he distilled the fear of totalitarianism better even than Orwell (although my other favourite short novel [...]

By skepticlawyer | Also posted in Literature | Comments (5)

Women and sci-fi

June 27, 2008 – 7:53 pm

I came across this interesting post on how to get women more interested in sci-fi writing and film. I’m probably not the best chick to ask about this – all my favourite films are sci-fi films, as well as most of my favourite television series. I also have a large sci-fi/fantasy book collection. I think [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Feminism, General, Literature, Science | Comments (95)

The Left Hand of Darkness

May 26, 2008 – 9:03 am

The other day I was reading Ursula Le Guin’s novel, The Left Hand of Darkness. I hadn’t read it for 10 or so years; I had forgotten what an excellent book it was.
Shortly, the book involves a male human diplomat and explorer arriving in a world, Gethen, where the sentient inhabitants are humanoid androgynes. For [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Children, Law, Society, anthony daniels | Comments (11)

Not so much gibberish as derivative and boring

April 18, 2008 – 8:37 pm

I was rather amused to see that the Judge hearing the J.K. Rowling copyright infringement case has described Rowling’s plotlines as “gibberish”.
To explain briefly, as outlined in this article from The Times, Rowling is asking the Manhattan Federal Court to block publication of The Harry Potter Lexicon, a guide to places and names in the [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Law, Literature, Society | Comments (2)

Property law and the One Ring

April 4, 2008 – 11:57 pm

Can it really be true? Yes, it is true. The blog Law is Cool features an essay about Lord of the Rings from a property law perspective! Here is a brief extract:
Consider the following facts which seem ripped from a first year property law exam:

Sauron holds ownership in the Ring through accession, by working one [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Fark!, Law | Comments (5)

Through the looking glass darkly?

February 22, 2008 – 3:17 pm

After the rather serious and contentious nature of my previous post, I thought I might move to less serious material (hat tip to Dave Bath for sharing this with me).
Comparative Law Blog notes that Lewis Carroll’s books Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are the most widely quoted children’s books in judgments. I [...]

By Legal Eagle | Also posted in Fark!, Law | Comments (9)

I want to be a hobbit

July 3, 2007 – 2:04 pm

When I was in Grade 2, we had to write down what we wanted to be when we grew up. I wrote something to the effect that I wanted to be a hobbit, and if I couldn’t achieve that, I’d like to be a fairy with wings. There was nothing about being a lawyer. I [...]

By Legal Eagle | Comments (7)