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29 May 2014 / Dominic Regan
Categories: Features
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Book review: Zuckerman on Civil Procedure

“I would urge every litigator to acquire and devour this work”

Author: Adrian Zuckerman
Publisher: Sweet & Maxwell
ISBN: 9781847039606
Price: £199

Smash! Bash! Wallop! Batman ? No, Zuckerman.

I adored this book. Those who like their commentaries to be prefaced by obsequious terms such as “It is submitted with great respect” may detest it. No punches are pulled and the work is the better for this approach. 

Admittedly, we did not get off to a good start. The opening line of the preface to the first edition (this is the third) states: “Civil procedure is both simpler and more complex than is usually assumed.” Sorry but civil process, despite the reforms of Woolf and Jackson, remains full of intrigue.

Long overdue update

No doubt this long overdue update was provoked by the Jackson reforms and indeed there is a warm preface written by the man himself. While the text is declared to be up to date until August 2013, before the Court of Appeal terrified the legal world by deciding Mitchell v News Group [2013] EWCA Civ 1537 as it

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