8 World-famous Writer with a Law Degree

To become successful, today’s novice writer needs an average of about 10 years of hard work and a lot of ambition. Writing does not have as many strict rules as working in the public sector, which requires a certain amount of work experience, a resume submission form and a federal cover letter. You can even combine the writer’s occupation with work in another field.

But even if your career as a writer did not work out, you should not despair. There are many examples of prominent people who found themselves in literature, although they were building a different career.

Philosophers, writers, artists – here we prepared the listing of famous people who had a law degree or even worked in their specialty, but the whole world found out about them in a completely different role. And it’s great that at that time there was no that many writing services like this https://federalresumeguide.com/5-best-legal-resume-writing-services/ After all, circumstances could have been such that we would never have known about their genius.

One of the most famous lawyers in the world is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. A student of Leipzig University became a certified lawyer in 1771. For four years he was engaged in legal practice, and simultaneously published the novel The Suffering of Young Werther (1772) and the historical drama Goetz of Berlichingen (1773).

Among the failed lawyers there are many world-famous writers. One of the most striking is Honore de Balzac. In 1816, he entered the Paris School of Law and, as a student, began to work as a law firm, and after that, with a family friend, notary Passet. But the plans of Balzac’s parents to make him the heir to the law office failed – in 1819 he decided to become a writer, and he succeeded. However, the work of a lawyer did not go without a trace – the everyday life of lawyers is described in his works.

Another writer with legal education  is Maurice Meterlink, known for the play “The Blue Bird”, was born in the family of a wealthy notary. He graduated from the Faculty of Law of the University of Ghent and in 1885 received the right to practice law. This did not work, but in 1911 Maurice Meterlink became a Nobel Prize in Literature.

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Charles Perrault graduated from the university, but took private law classes for three years, after which he received a law degree and bought a lawyer’s license. However, by profession, he did not work long and soon became a clerk with his brother-architect Claude Perrault. Charles published his most famous fairy tales – “Cinderella”, “Sleeping Beauty”, “Blue Beard”, “Puss in Boots” under the name of the son of Pierre d’Harmancourt to separate them from other, much less well-known literary works of his authorship, which he himself considered more significant.

Another Nobel laureate in literature, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, also studied law, in 1946 he entered the University of Bogota. But even in the years of study, he became interested in literature and journalism and eventually dropped out of school.

Jules Verne, the son of a lawyer, received a bachelor’s degree in 1846, and a law degree in 1849. At this point, he managed to move from his native Nantes to Paris solely out of a desire to do theater. Vern, who chose law under the pressure of his father, did not rush to work in his specialty. An attempt to work in a notary office is unsuccessful – it takes time from literature. An alternative is the banking service and preparing students for admission to law school. After the opening of the Lyric Theater in Paris, Jules becomes his secretary.

Henry Fielding, one of the founders of the realistic novel, has a significant place in the history of law enforcement: using his powers as a judge, he, together with his brother John, created the famous London police unit of the “snoop” from The Street Street (The Bow Street Runners). In 1728, he went to Leiden to study classical art and law at the university. But there was no money and after two years of study I had to return to London. To earn money, Fielding began to write for the theater, which attracted the attention of the authorities. So, the result of his work is the Theatrical Censorship Act of 1737, which actually forbade joking on political topics from the stage. Because of this, Fielding left the theater and continued his career in law. By that time he was married and had two children: in order to support his family, he enrolled as a student in Temple and in 1740 received the title of lawyer. In 1748, Fielding became the Chief Justice of London. In parallel, his literary career also advanced. According to historian M. Trevelyan, they were the best judges in London in the eighteenth century and did a lot to improve the judicial system and prison conditions. Although John Fielding was blind, he succeeded his older brother as Chief Justice and became known as the “Blind Beak” from Bow Street for his ability to independently identify criminals by their voices. In January 1752, Henry Fielding took up periodicals.

Franz Kafka received his doctorate in law from Charles University in Prague. After university, he became an official in the insurance department, where he worked until his retirement (due to illness) – 1922. Kafka said that as a lawyer you can penetrate everything: it is not surprising, because for thirteen years of work he investigated and inspected insurance cases.