Telling Your Story

Here's an interesting piece on storytelling during legal action. Just as in the public arena, the best lawyers learn to weave a story out of the facts of their case, rather than just throw a series of facts at judge and jury and let them decide.

Or as the author puts it:

“I sometimes wonder about contemporary law school education,” he said. “I’ve seen a number of young lawyers who seem to think that if you just put everything in a bag, shake it up and then pour it out in front of the judge and jury, they’ll put it together for you.”

“Maybe it’s because no one’s really reading or writing these days,” said Angus. “Young people don’t read books; they don’t read papers. And when they ‘write,’ they use computers to cobble together little snippets of information, have a spell-checker proof it, and even let the computer put in paragraph breaks.”