Anyone here a Fellow of All Souls , or even be invited to apply?

Not really sure whats its purpose, unless you want to be an academic. Or is it just the prestige of passing the exams as a test against yourself?

The bar does seem incredibly high, but I guess thats the point! 

I was invited to take the examination fellowship exams many years ago. I took one look at the sample papers and wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. It's a very good antidote to any intellectual arrogance one may have developed as an undergrad... 

And yeah the bar being high is kind of the point! 

Did you not attempt it DDS? I just wonder, what place it has in academia, or in commerce and industry. Many brilliant academics, worth world leading reputations wont have sat.

I see David Pannick is a Fellow.

You dont need an invite to sit the exam.    Also the questions themselves are not that hard are they?   They are essentially essay titles.   The tricky bit is scoring highly.

Schoolmate of mine went there and we visited him a few times. Bright guy, rather peculiar. Almost too academic for mainstream academia - has spent years researching in various libraries in the Stans.

Great gig if you can get it.  Get paid for doing very little, if you so choose (and well fed too, plus they have a great wine cellar). Almost as good as the UK's furlough scheme!

 

Yes guy, thats the trick bit, scoring well. What about the time pressures though.

Here is an example. Water, write a all souls level essay on that in four hours. Tricky, guy, yeah?

Heh, no I didn't Ebitda.  It was 20 odd years ago now and things may well have changed but from memory at the time you had to sit a specialist exam in two subjects and there was no way I could have sat one in something other than law.

Guy - At least to my tiny brain the questions looked pretty hard. 

 

 

ebitda, the tricky bit is "write an all souls level essay"   I am not sure why the title "water" in itself is particularly tricky is it?

They look like undergraduate essay questions to me, what is hard is answering well.    I just struggle to see why the questions themselves are intimidating?  How could they be easier?

lawp-  my point is I dont see why the questions are particularly intimidating.  They are just standard essay questions - of course if you know nothing about the topic in question you cant answer, otherwise it is just adopting normal essay technique- whether you can do it to all soul fellow standard is another question, but that would be true of any conceivable essay question.

I expect it's just a test to see if you've got good bantz for top table or whatever. 

"Water" - I think not. Pass us the trunnion of claret and we can watch Dave getting stuck into that pig's head.  

13. ‘The law of torts at the beginning of the nineteenth century was still recognisably medieval’ (DAVID IBBETSON). Discuss.

Heh. Ibbetson supervised me in legal history and tort law. I think I could have a reasonable stab at that question (it’s all about ‘action on the case’, right?) but I think he’d be disappointed at the remarkable lack of brilliance I have displayed since his teachings.

Goes back to shuffling paper.

I know someone who was a prize fellow there (or whatever they're called). He grew a beard and took up smoking because he thought it made him seem more sophisticated. 

I don’t think the questions are “intimidating” per se but I wouldn’t particularly rate my chances of producing a stunningly original and elegant answer to any of them, which is the point. Anyone, even with limited knowledge, could hold a discussion of that kind of question - which is one reason that answering them with distinction is hard. You can’t cheat by cramming “knowledge”.

Heh, at having too dine in College for a minimum number of times per term. 

How antiquated and out of touch with the real world!

Thankfully there's nothing equivalent in the modern legal world to which so many of us belong.....

Oh, hang on a minute.