Forever
Rumpole: The Best of the Rumpole
Stories
By John Mortimer
(Viking,
528 pages, $30)
Lucky is the man, woman, or child whose Christmas gift
list is made up of readers. There’s much to choose from this
season, not the least being this fine, “best of” collection of
stories featuring the late John Mortimer’s delightful,
claret-soaked advocate, Horace Rumpole. A character Dickens would
have been proud to have created.
Yes, that’s the Horace Rumpole, the short, plump,
poetry-spouting, barrister for the defense brought to the small
screen in 42 episodes of “Rumpole of the Bailey (London’s central
criminal court)” between 1978 and 1992. The episodes, aired in
America on PBS’s Mystery series, are based closely on the
short stories by Mortimer, himself a barrister, mostly for the
defense, before his writing career became so successful he was
obliged to hang up his wig. They star the incomparable Leo McKern
as Rumpole.
Mortimer, who died in 2009 at 85, gave us more than 100
Rumpole stories in 12 collections beginning with Rumpole of the
Bailey in 1978 through Rumpole and the Primrose Path
in 2002. The stories and Mortimer’s character came as a revelation
to those of us who despaired of ever encountering a lawyer we could
love. Who knew courtroom drama could be this much fun?
The stories are intelligent, witty, and finely crafted.
Mortimer uses Rumpole as a foil to present his somewhat jaundiced
view of the state and practice of British justice, and to remark,
with great comic effect, on the cultural oddities of the
day.
Rumpole, with great sympathy for the petty foibles and
weaknesses of mankind, always appears for the defense and prides
himself on never pleading guilty. The indomitable Rumpole is a
crafty cross-examiner who can whipsaw witnesses that include dodgy
“experts,” bent coppers, and self-interested pleaders. It’s jury
advocacy that Rumpole cherishes, as did his creator. Both admit to
knowing little about the law, and are not interested in arguing its
finer points. No Pharisee is our Horace.
Rumpole also specializes in annoying judges — who, he
complains, too often put their thumbs on the scale in favor of the
prosecution — with his brashness, which often comes within
millimeters of contempt. Among Rumpole’s many courtroom weapons (as
was the case with Mortimer) is humor. How much tougher it is for
prosecutors when the jury is laughing at their case. But how much
the better for readers.
In 1993 Mortimer published The Best of Rumpole, a
collection of seven of his favorite stories which, he said, “Made
me laugh a little when I was writing them and which drew some
laughter from the actors when they read through the television
versions.” These seven appear in Forever, along with seven
of his later stories and a fragment of a story uncompleted at
Mortimer’s death.
The first story in this collection, “Rumpole and the
Younger Generation,” is the first Rumpole story Mortimer wrote and
sets the tone for the Rumpole saga in a long and amusing first
paragraph explaining why the nearly 70 year-old Rumpole will “take
up my pen” to narrate his career at the bar. Long time readers or
TV viewers of the series will recognize other early favorites such
as “Rumpole and the Show Folk,” “Rumpole and the Tap End,” and
“Rumpole à la Carte.”
Though Rumpole never changes — only one of the ways in
which he is conservative — the world and the practice of law do.
Later stories, such as “Rumpole and the Primrose Path,” tell of an
era where computers and other electronic gadgets that mystify
Horace have replaced typewriters in legal chambers, and the
profession attempts to run itself in a more business-like manner.
In “Primrose” Rumpole encounters, amusingly, Luci Gribble, 3 Equity
Court’s new marketing director, who is a fount of business-speak
and neologisms. Rumpole, whose favorite reading is The Oxford
Book of English Verse, can barely understand her.
I should here deal with the small amount of blowback I’ve
gotten from some TAS readers when I’ve whooped up Mortimer
and Rumpole. Both creator and creation in this case are liberals,
these prosecutors charge. Mortimer was indeed a lifetime supporter
of the Labour Party and had some unkind things to say about
Margaret Thatcher. Rumpole, of course, never pleads guilty. And
really needn’t do so on this case.
Mortimer’s liberalism was more of the libertarian variety.
He defended numerous free speech cases in his legal career. He was
the kind of liberal who believed people should be able to do what
they wish, rather than the far more numerous kind who wish to
micro-manage everyone’s life.
And Rumpole — though he invariably appears for the
defense — is not defending crime, but the presumption of
innocence. A cornerstone of any free society. And though he
regularly pillories judges, cops, and prosecutors, he is not
anti-authority, but anti-abuse of authority. The insolence of
office is a malady here, in the UK, and in most of the rest of the
known universe. Our Horace will have none of it.
Defense stipulates (in this case my defense of Rumpole)
that real burglars and safe crackers are not as cuddly as the
Timsons, the extended clan of South London villains Rumpole has
built a career on keeping out of the nick. But red-blooded
TAS-reading conservatives oppose the mailed fist of
government crushing the individuals. So does Rumpole, even if he
does take it to exotic lengths from time to time.
Mortimer didn’t adopt the more noxious tics of the
cultural left. Through his alter ego, Rumpole, he had a great deal
of fun at the expense of geek-branch feminists, enviro-nutters,
anti-smoking zealots, neo-prohibitionists, food faddists, and all
manner of Puritan defenders of the politically
correct.
How much better the world would be if all its liberals
were like John Mortimer and Horace Rumpole. And how much better the
Christmas holidays will go down with these stories to dip into,
either for old Rumpole hands, or for those who’ve yet to have the
pleasure of Horace Rumpole’s company.
Forever Rumpole is well titled. So
long as there is sympathy for sinful and muddled mankind, a delight
in humor, an interest in justice, and any love of freedom, Horace
Rumpole will indeed be forever.
