On the Bookshelves
A Wide-Ranging Curiosity
Alan Dershowitz writes the way he thinks
Ask
Professor Alan M. Dershowitz to rank his favorite professional
activities, and his response is unequivocal.
"I love the actual act of teaching, being in the classroom, the most,"
he said. "But a close second is sitting home alone with my white legal
pad and pen, all by myself, and just writing, writing, writing."
The evidence suggests that Dershowitz is not overstating the case.
"Rights from Wrongs: A Secular Theory of the Origins of Rights" (Basic
Books), published in November 2004, was his ninth book since the
beginning of 2000--and his 19th since 1982, when Random House published
his first popular book about law, "The Best Defense."
Furthermore, there's no reason to believe that the prolific Professor
Dershowitz will be slowing down any time soon. He has two more books in
the hopper. One, an examination of pre-emptive government action as a
tool for self-protection, is already in book-length manuscript form and
undergoing edits. The second, which he's calling "The Case for Peace,"
is a follow-up to his 2003 book "The Case for Israel" and will lay out
his ideas on how to achieve lasting peace in Israel.
At the moment, both of these pending projects tangibly exist as stacks
of paper within boxes that are piled on one side of his Hauser Hall
office, where his earlier books, some of them foreign-language editions,
line the walls. On a recent Friday afternoon, Dershowitz stood next to
this massive output and talked about how he does it. He reached into a
"Case for Peace" box and extracted a white legal pad, words written on
every other line to provide space for additions. "I write everything by
hand, and then I give it to Jane to type," he said, referring to Jane
Wagner, his assistant.
While the legal pad is the first palpable evidence of a Dershowitz book,
the process actually begins months or years ahead of the writing, he
points out. "For me, the trick to writing a book is to think it through
completely," he said. "I separate out the craft of writing from the
thinking it through. My wife will tell you I walk around the house,
smacking my head and saying, 'I don't have it. I don't know where it's
going.' And then suddenly it gels, I sit down to do it, and the writing
comes very fast. Very fast."
He doesn't follow a daily schedule, as many writers do. But he does
follow a weekly one, which begins Friday night after his classes are
over and continues through Tuesday.
Dershowitz also relies on various types of cross-fertilization. First,
he's also a prolific author of opinion articles for newspapers and
magazines, and some of that work finds its way into his books. Second,
his classroom and seminar activity also often informs his books. He
points out, for instance, that his pre-emption manuscript has been
influenced by a seminar he taught on the subject during the fall
semester. "I handed out to students in the seminar a very, very rough
draft of a few chapters. We went over some of them in class, students
did papers, and in a couple of instances I was able to incorporate some
of their ideas--and give them credit, obviously--into some of what I was
writing."
Finally, another obvious contributing factor to Dershowitz's writing is
his wide-ranging curiosity. His post-1999 books alone have addressed
international terrorism ("Why Terrorism Works"), legal history ("America
Declares Independence" and "America on Trial"), leading a fulfilling
professional life ("Letters to a Young Lawyer"), civil liberties
("Shouting Fire"), the origins of rights ("Rights from Wrongs") and
religion ("The Genesis of Justice").
Ask Dershowitz about the potential for burnout, and he just smiles and
shakes his head. "I just never feel that," he said. "I'm always
energized."
And it's an energy that he wants others to share. Recently, elementary
students at P.S. 312 back in Dershowitz's hometown of Brooklyn, N.Y.,
asked if he might share some thoughts on writing. On April 14, he sent
them a letter with the following words of advice: "Write like you speak
and like you think. Don't try to be fancy. Use simple words. Brooklynese
is one of the most expressive languages in the world. You speak it. Now
write it. ... I know it will move me. So keep writing. Write every day."
--Dick Dahl
Next: Special Section: New Thinking About Crime and Punishment
