The Mason Papers

The following review is extracted from the speech delivered by Professor Zines at the launch of The Mason Papers. The full transcript may be read by downloading the PDF file from the Federation Press website (see Supplements). [L]eaving aside matters not included in the book, I do not know of any Australian law book by a single author that has such a broad coverage. Moreover, the contributions are written in a style that is lucid, succinct and elegant, as we have come to expect from Sir Anthony Mason. There is someone else who must be mentioned. Professor Lindell engaged in a Herculean task in determining what among the author’s voluminous pieces should be included. … Above all, Professor Lindell is to be commended for bringing together so well in the Introduction the various themes in the book, and also for his discussion of the propriety of extra-curial speech-making and writing by judges. Federation Press (which has done so much to support Australian legal scholarship) has produced a handsome volume with a colourful and most attractive dust jacket. They are to be congratulated. Justice Dyson Heydon, in the paper to which I referred earlier, indicated various qualities of modern judgments that he disliked and added, disapprovingly: “There is much talk of policy and interests and values.” That can certainly be said of The Mason Papers, but in no disparaging sense. It is in my opinion a highly commendable work. - Professor Leslie Zines

Anthony Mason and Marian Muratore, a husband and wife team, closely collaborated on “The Bluffer’s Guide to Men and Women.” Never before had they looked at men and women so thoroughly and so candidly - at least in each other’s company. For him this process served to increase the fascinating mystery and mystique of women. For her, men became even more comprehensible, not to say transparent. As it happens, these were approximately the same relative positions that they started with.