Legal Writing and Research Commons^™

“All We Have To Decide Is What To Do With The Time Given To Us”: Using Concepts Of Narrative Time To Draft More Persuasive Legal Arguments, Jennifer Sheppard

Marquette Law Review

When taught to draft a statement of facts or a statement of the case, law students and new lawyers are often told to “tell a story” and that chronological order is usually the best organizational strategy to use when telling that story. While much has been written in recent years on how to draft a story in the legal context, little scholarship is devoted to how to draft a story using chronology or how a lawyer can shape and manipulate time within a story to better advocate for a client. Legal scholars seem to think that the use of chronology …