NEWS

The Inner Temple: A Community of Communities

13 November 2007

The Inner Temple: A Community of Communities is a richly illustrated celebratory volume, which is published on the occasion of 400th anniversary of James I’s Charter to the Inner and Middle Temple and provides a fascinating panorama of life, law and learning in the Inner Temple over seven centuries.

This unique portrait reflects the distinctively collegiate life of the Inner Temple through stimulating and entertaining memories, writings and archive material of members of the Society, both living and long since dead.

The beautifully designed and produced volume covers the history, architecture, treasures and estate of the Inn and the Temple Church from the coming of the lawyers in the fourteenth century to the bustling realities of the twenty-first century. Along the way, readers will encounter not just insightful accounts of the teaching and learning of law down the centuries, but also masques, revels, feasting, poets and playwrights, Dr Johnson (a former resident), Bram Stoker (of Dracula fame) and a distinguished literary heritage extending from Geoffrey Chaucer to the creator of the immortal Rumpole of the Bailey.

From the Knights Templar who built the Church through to the modern sightseers who come to follow the trail laid out in The Da Vinci Code, the story of the members and inhabitants of the Inner Temple is laid out in all its variety and splendour.

Winston Asante recalls a lecture given by Rumpole’s creator, Sir John Mortimer, in which he compared the Commercial Bar to the Criminal Bar. He said: “You go to the Commercial Bar – human beings had swindled other human beings to the point pf penury – and you would have thought that a punch up would have been in order. Instead, there they all sit, staring at each other with gloomy faces. In contrast, go to the Old Bailey. One human being is accused of killing another human being, and what do you find in court ? Laughter !”

The Bar has always been a stepping stone to a career in politics and the present and past political landscape is replete with Inner Templars. Two British Prime Ministers have been members of the Inn: George Grenville (1763 – 5) and Clement Attlee (1945 – 51). There have also been a number of highly distinguished foreign politicians, among them three of the men who shaped the independence of the Indian subcontinent: Jawaharlal Nehru, Mohammed Ali Jinnah and Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi, who went on to become the revered ‘father of Indian independence’.

Sir David Hirst remembers when he was a student at the Inn in the 1950’s and recalls the time he contacted the then Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, to ask him for his recollections of his first year at the Bar for inclusion in a Temple magazine. Attlee’s handwritten response was somewhat brief. “Dear Hirst, I remember nothing about my first year at the Bar. Yours sincerely, C R Attlee”. This message was duly published. No wonder Mr Attlee was famous as a man of few words !

Lord Justice May, the Inn’s Treasurer for 2008, comments “this book provides a wonderful insight into who we are and what we do. I commend it to you”

-ENDS-

NOTES TO EDITORS

Imprint: Third Millennium Publishing, London

Editors: Clare Rider and Val Horsler

Publication date: 20th November 2007 / RRP: £45 / ISBN: 978 1 903942 66 6

Specification: Hardback, 192 pages, 280 x 240 mm, over 200 colour and b/w illustrations

The Publisher: Third Millennium Publishing specialises in publishing and design for the art and heritage markets and is currently working on a number of book projects with leading schools, Oxbridge colleges, universities (including a celebratory volume on the 800th anniversary of Cambridge University), cathedrals, regiments, and museums and galleries in the UK and USA. In June this year TMP also published a Portrait of Lincoln’s Inn.

For further information contact Michael D Jackson, Marketing Manager, Third Millennium Information Ltd, 2-5 Benjamin St, EC1M 5QL. Tel: +44 (0)207 336 0144. Email: mj@tmiltd.com. Website: www.tmiltd.com