Planet Law School
A Post Script to the Introduction
[ top of page ]The introductory page text was written (in part) by Thane Messinger, graduate of the University of Texas Law School, an attorney and adjunct professor in Honolulu, and author of The Young Lawyer's Jungle Book: A Survival Guide.
[Editor: Mr. Messinger is not the author of Planet Law School, although he did review and comment on a manuscript draft.]
Mr. Messinger wanted to add:
It's hard to convey to those who have not yet been to law school just how disorienting the experience will be. Yet, if it were only difficult, most law students would do fine...and there'd be no need for this book. Sadly, law school is much, much more than difficult. It is mind- and emotion-altering. Worse, for those not prepared, it can be career- and soul-wrenching. Little wonder lawyers are such a troubled lot.
The author of Planet Law School has done a service to future generations of law students -- a service for which he (or she) will never be acknowedged. Although I do not wholly agree with everything written in Planet Law School, any disagreements are trifling and tangential to its main purpose and grand accomplishment: to set out, for the first time, just what a law student (or future law student) should be doing. I was astounded when I was given a manuscript for comments: page after page reviewing all the legal books, tapes, and accessories on which I had spent (and, many times, wasted) hundreds of hours (...and dollars) that I could ill-afford to lose.
I felt a chill as I read a passage in the book: "I wish to God that I had known this before I went." Truer words are seldom written. In this, law school is like military service: Basic training is Hell, and everyone is supposed to know that it's Hell, right? Indeed, there's a macho pride in this Hellishness -- those who survive are obviously grander than those who do not.
Yet the reasons for failure are not perfectly correlated with being unfit for duty. Not even close. Perhaps most painful -- failures that I have witnessed firsthand -- is failure because one is not prepared for that Hell.
That is a social sin: We cannot make the path easy, but there ought to be an unwavering duty by gatekeepers to inform -- completely and honestly -- newcomers about the reality they are about to enter. A dispassionate "Heads Up!" -- not a mindless, macho "We'll let you join us if you have what it takes...and that includes figuring out what we want."
Those who are from families with a soldier, sailor, or airman (or, for visitors to planet law school, an attorney) will likely succeed. Once you know what the game is, then it's just a game. If not, though, it's likely that you will fail -- or, worse (and much more likely) -- survive...but just barely, and minus a soul.
Part of the problem inheres to the law school process. Once one graduates, there's little incentive to spend time thinking about the past: it's time to move on to the bar exam, then on to a job, then on to cases, then on to trial, then....
But it gets worse: As the author states, those who do well in law school just naturally assume that they succeeded by their brilliance, and their brilliance unaided. Wrong. There are lots of brilliant people in law school -- and about half of them will fail. Perhaps not "fail" literally, but "failure" is relative -- especially among the talented folks who populate law schools.
A law student finding him- or herself in the bottom half of a forced curve is an experience almost worse than death. The top half moves on. The top ten percent or so soars -- with a psychological (and fiscal) advantage in maintaining the fiction that they were predestined for greatness -- and the bottom half is too embarrassed, confused, and defeated to figure out what went wrong. (And, when they do -- if they do -- it's too late. As Planet Law School explains, and as all second-year students learn, first-year law school grades are absolutely, positively everything. This is a reality you probably won't believe -- it is a little crazy -- until it's too late.) No one has an incentive to figure out just what, precisely, it is that separates the haves from the has-beens in law school. It's an intimidating process. But it needn't be a lonely one, now.
Reading this book -- as an attorney many years out of law school -- angered me. No, that's too mild. Were I King, I would make this text mandatory for all LSAT takers -- no other book comes close to Planet Law School for completeness or honesty -- and, just to make sure the message gets across, I would test students on it before allowing them into law school. It's that important.
Read Planet Law School as soon as you possibly can. I hope the book doesn't overwhelm you, but if you do not read it, I can assure you, with sadness, that law school will.
Good luck to all...
Thane J. Messinger
Honolulu, Hawaii
19 February 1998And a second note:
Hello, All -
The author of Planet Law School, with whom I have become friends, sent me a series of emails between a reader of PLS and him. In the emails (and quite as an aside), the reader continued to assert that I was he ["Atticus"], and that his pointed denials were just part of an on-going, conspiratorial ruse.
Aside from the amusement of the exchange, I promised to add a note to the above one. (Oddly enough, I had argued, editorially, that there was no need for the book to be pseudonymous, and I hadn't given much thought to the possibility that my connection to the project, as a reviewer, would lead fingers to me.) I suppose there's no easy way to prove this--proving a negative has always been rather a thankless sport--but I thought I might give it a shot.
Perhaps most telling is the author's assertion throughout Planet Law School that he is, first and foremost, a trial lawyer. (Having seen him in trial when I happened to be in his state, I can attest that he is very, very good.) Although I have been to court on occasion--usually under great protest--I am no trial attorney, nor do I aspire to life at the bar, literally. I much prefer the coziness of a transactions practice, leaving the joys of courtroom battles to those with more of that killer instinct.
Second, he is much better looking than I. (Or, at least, that's what he wrote in his emails to the student.)
Third . . . several of his opinions, expressed either in illustration of certain points in the book, or merely as asides, differ from mine. (Indeed, on one occasion I was so opposed to the example used that I threatened to withdraw my participation, if it were not changed or removed. On another issue, I think I might throw a similar tantrum for the second edition.) Other differences are less pronounced, and we've engaged in reasonably friendly combat over their dimensions and causes. I'm not sure whether his influence on my thinking hasn't been more profound than my prattling on about his [obviously wrong] opinions. In any event, it's been a nice break from practice, Sir Atticus.
Finally, there's a technical matter that should put this to rest. Let's see . . . how can I put this gracefully. In Planet Law School, he mentioned in passing that his LSAT score placed him in the 94th percentile. While that's certainly one helluva score, mine was, well, higher.
Hmmm . . . nope, that wasn't graceful at all.
My bad.
In any horribly self-referential event, I am not he.
Again, good luck to all . . . (even those among you who do disbelieve).
PS: If Reason Number Four makes you want to send some hate mail . . . here, here's a useful email address: atticus@fineprintpress.com
......
But, seriously. Send the publisher an email, and they'll forward it on to me. They've promised: Love mail to me, Hate mail to Atticus.
[ top of page ]Thane J. Messinger
Honolulu, Hawaii
6 October 2000
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