60 The Journal of College Orientation and Transition

One L
By Scott Turow
New York, Warner Books, 1997, 287 pages

Reviewed by Dr. Janet B. Rainey 
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

This is a book for anyone to read who is interested in or planning to attend law
school, or perhaps more importantly, work with students transitioning into new learning
and living environments, such as a graduate or professional school.  Scott Turow 
chronicles his first year as a student of the Harvard Law School, the oldest and most
prestigious law school in the US  Turow recorded the intellectual and emotional trials
and tribulations of survival during a year of uncertainty.  The questions he has about
himself and the reasons for wanting to become a lawyer are revealed during the end of
his last term of the first year.

The book is written as a journal of the experiences of true concerns and questioning
of himself, fellow students, faculty, and these relationships.  The interactions with 
students bonds them together, yet is also keeps them separate.  The competition for 
being the best in the best, most elite law school in the country compounds the simplest
assignments.  The humiliation from professors takes the human aspect out of law, and he
recognized that classroom terror has been a fixed aspect of legal education.

The first year law class numbered 140 and all students took their classes together.
Students were placed in groups by section and took all of the same classes.  This 
sectioning did provide for the development of small study groups and building personal
relationships.  The relationship between faculty and student was distant and did not 
promote one-on-one discussion.  Preparation for each class was intense and for the 
student who was not prepared, it was torture to anticipate the humiliation that would be
their fortune to receive.  

Unlike, traditional graduate schools, exams and grades were not given throughout
the course of each semester thus keeping the atmosphere and tensions heightened and
stressful.  This lack of traditional benchmarking is difficult given that there is not 
interaction with faculty outside the classroom.   There is no measuring mechanism in
place to give the students information as to their standing in the class.  Exams were 
given after each term and all material presented during the term was included in the
examination.

The Socratic method of teaching was also new to the first year law students.   This
method was not simply lecturing; it was discussion that began when a student was 
selected without warning by the professor and questioned in depth about the case and its
outcomes.  The professor would continue to questions the student on the details of the
case, getting narrower with each question.  If the student was unable to respond, the 
professor would move to another student and interrogate in the same manner.  This type
of interrogation was often terrorizing and humiliating to the student by the professor.

If the student was unable to answer the questions, it often lead to the humiliation of
the student by the professor.  The professor had used the opportunity to illustrate the



61Spring 2002  •  Volume 9, Number 2

depth of his own knowledge and expertise and power over the student.  Other students
viewed the humiliation of a student as “thank goodness it wasn’t me this time.”  The
interrogation often also created isolation and embarrassment for the victim. 

The humiliation was characterized by terror of the professor as the custodian of 
justice.  This professor was a learned person who was brutal in the process of teaching
students.  This brutality was accepted by most students as part of their learning, but did
not believe it to be the way to teach law.  Faculty were criticized for their style of 
teaching, presentation of material, and lack of humanness in teaching.  

Students were very competitive with each other and also with themselves.  The
admission that competitiveness leads to recognition and pleasure was part of the nature
of being in law school.  The way of containing the competitive feelings was simply to
deny them, but that was the edge that got one into the prestigious Harvard Law School.
To openly give in to the competitive feelings was to win recognition and favor from the
professors.  Usually those who had gained recognition were viewed with disdain from
fellow students, yet also admired. 

Change in the life of a student was expected.  There were obvious changes such as
relocation, lifestyle, financial, relationships between student and faculty and uncertainty
as to whether the right decision had been made to be a law student.   There were 
underlying changes that would not be identified until much later in the year.  These
changes were more personal and not discussed with classmates.

The courses did not seem to connect during the first semester.  During the last
semester of the term, it was the performance at “moot” court that Turow realized that the
courses had been building blocks for this difficult presentation.  The realization that
everything that he had been taught and read was an integral part of his learning at the
Harvard Law School.  The humiliation and grilling by the faculty had been for a reason
and it was to teach the student to analyze and look at a case from different perspectives,
to not have a narrow vision.  

The transition that Harvard Law School students have to make is difficult but is
achievable.  A first year law student with persistence, determination and a will to survive
the elite, inhuman, prestigious Harvard Law School will return for the second year to
continue the struggle of becoming a lawyer.  For orientation professionals this is a 
powerful book and provides a very telling story of the best and worst in higher 
education.  At the very least, it catalogs much of the raw emotion that new students go
through when entering a new institution and program, and this can be an excellent source
of conversation for those looking to build experiences and programs that meet student
psychological and academic needs.