Forgotten Authors No 12: AP Herbert

Alan Patrick Herbert is almost out of print, but should have more readers today. Herbert served in two world wars, survived Gallipoli, was a long-standing member of Parliament and a social reformer who worked to end outdated divorce and obscenity laws, and was knighted by Churchill. There is a spirit of gaiety about him that mitigates against fame; apart from Wodehouse, light-hearted authors survive less well than serious ones. He wrote the lyrics to popular songs and shows, translating new books for Offenbach, and once highlighted the complexity of the British licensing laws by accusing the House of Commons of selling liquor without a licence.

This interest in the absurdities of the legal system caused him to write Misleading Cases, six volumes that operate on a wonderfully simple premise: a judge and a defendant square off against one another in a series of skirmishes designed to test the limits of the law.

Albert Haddock is a tireless Everyman who would test the patience of a saint; he makes out a cheque on a cow and leads it to the office of the Collector of Taxes. "'Was the cow crossed?' 'No, your Worship, it was an open cow.'" The question is, did he break the law? Haddock rows the wrong way up a flooded street, and is arrested. Haddock has his wine glass pinched by a waiter, and sues for damages. Haddock argues his way out of a charge of obstruction by referring to an obscure point in the Magna Carta.

The cases were fictional, but were sometimes reported in the press as fact. Along the way, big issues were aired and serious political points were scored. What is the meaning of education? What exactly are politicians? How much freedom do we really have? Herbert's tone is light, but the questions give one pause. The books open all kinds of intelligent dialogue between thinking people. Is that why they disappeared?

Misleading Cases aired as a television series (now apparently lost) that ran for three seasons in the 1960s, with Roy Dotrice as Haddock and the wonderful Alastair Sim as the judge. Sim is exasperated but clearly an admirer of the defendant's knowledge of his rights.

"People must not do things for fun," Herbert warns. "There is no reference to fun in any act of parliament." Read Herbert and bring back the fun.