Brush With the Law

Just how tough are the countrys most prestigious law schools? Most alumni would answer with stories of humiliating Socratic dialogue failures in the classroom and allnight, caffeinefueled cram sessions.Until now, the traditional concept of the lawschool experience was the one presented in Scott Turows OneL, published in 1977, a dark description of his first year at Harvard Law School. Twentyfour years later things have definitely changed. Turows book became the accepted primerand warningfor aspiring law students, giving them a glimpse of what awaited: grueling nonstop study, brutally competitive classes, endless research, and unfathomable terminology. It described a draconian prison and endless work in the company of equally obsessive, desperate fellow students.Yet, sidestepping terror and intimidation, law students (and new authors) Robert Byrnes and Jaime Marquart entered highly prestigious law schools, did things their own way, earned law degrees, and were hired by a Los Angeles law firm, turning Turows vision upside down. In their parallel narrativestwo twisted, hilarious, blighted, and glorious comingofage storiesByrnes and Marquart explain how they managed to graduate while spending most of their time in the pursuit of pleasure.Byrnes went to Stanford to reinvent himselfafter a false start in politics he wanted to explore the life of the mind. It took him virtually no time to discover that the law was neither particularly intriguing nor particularly challenging. He could play around the clock. When Byrnes wasnt biking he was getting drunk and smoking crack. Finding himself when he discovered the right woman, Byrnes finally moved to Los Angeles during his third year and flew upstate only to take final exams.Born and raised in a small town in Texas, Marquart had never lived outside the state before arriving at Harvard. Amazed at his own good luck, he approached school with all due diligence. Disenchantment followed shortly thereafter, and Marquart learned he neednt be intimidated by his classmates and teachers. With a mysterious and bizarre companionanother student called the KankoosJaime took up traveling but devoted most of his energy (and considerable money) to gambling, counting cards in casinos around the country.Irreverent, funny, and downright shocking, Brush with the Law will inspire undergraduates to bone up for the entrance exam, while outraging lawyers and the admissions officers of their beloved alma maters.Upon realizing how easy it was to get good grades, Jaime relates:I approached my second year with [one] goal . . . take classes that required the least amount of work and the least amount of attendance . . . To accomplish my . . . goal, I devised The System, a short instruction manual on the principles behind selecting and ditching law school classes. The Systems goal was to screw off as much as possible, with few if any consequences. from Brush with the Law