Come a Little Closer So That I Can See You My Pretty: The Use and Limits of Fiction Point of View Techniques in Appellate Briefs

Cathren Page, Barry University

Abstract

Come a Little Closer so That I Can See You my Pretty, The Use and Limits of Fiction Point of Techniques in Appellate Briefs began when I was struggling to explain point of view to my students in Appellate Advocacy. They represented a fictional criminal defendant whose bag was searched when the police were executing a premises warrant at his friend’s house. My students scrunched up their faces when I tried to explain why they should not start their facts with the friend’s crime that spurred the search. The crime happened first in time, so to them it came first. However, since their client defendant was absent for his friend’s crime, it did not happen first in the defendant’s experience. He only learned of it later. Finally, I used some clips from Mystic River to show how chronology affects point of view and empathy.

That lesson spurred this article. Typically, a legal conflict results because two parties have two differing points of view. More often than not, we can aid our clients when we reproduce their perspective, their experience, for the reader. We place the reader in the client’s point of view. Point of view is more than just first, second, or third person or omniscient, but actually includes degrees of distance. In distant writing, we see a client or character from a wide shot, from far away. In contrast, the closest point of view is internal. In my article, I have identified and listed many of the techniques that fiction writers use to create or eliminate distance. Then I give an example of each. I follow that with an example from an actual appellate brief where the technique was used. In some instances, I explain how the use of the technique is limited in appellate briefs due to ethical concerns, form conventions, or record limitations.