Prosser, Wade, Schwartz, Kelly and Partlett's Torts: Cases and Materials

by William L. Prosser, John Wade

Combining excellence in scholarship and ease of use, this best-selling casebook engages readers in and encourages critical thinking about tort law with its compelling stories, crisply edited classic tort cases, and discussion of legislation and new public policy. Unbiased in its approach and organized in manageable sections of information, the casebook expands law students understanding of tort law doctrine and rationale with helpful notes, memorable cases and statutes, and discussion of topics such as the increasing influence of legislatures on the common law of torts. This immensely popular casebook combines the best of the new tort cases while preserving the classics. It captures new trends and controversies in the law of torts, but the cases and notes are presented to allow the Professor to inject his or her perspectives and ideas without fighting the materials. Case selection for principal and note cases favors exemplifying cutting-edge doctrine and policy, while favoring memorable factual scenarios. Case selection of principal cases is based on well-written opinions, geographic as well as viewpoint diversity, and a mix of mainstream opinion with the occasional outlier or minority opinion, all designed to emphasize fundamental principles and contemporary policy debates. Through questions in the notes, students are prodded to think of themselves as lawyers actively engaged in practicing and making the law, not just as students passively engaged in studying it. Both theory and practicality permeate the book. The way cases are edited and the topics covered (including proof issues, joint and several liability, damages, and wrongful death and survival) make it particularly suitable for emphasizing procedural issues, litigation and counseling strategy, and legal reasoning. I

Genres: Textbooks, Law, School, Nonfiction

1276 pages, Hardcover

First published May 28, 2010

About the author

William Lloyd Prosser (1898- )

Reviews

[Katelyn Oswalt]

long story short i survived

[Katherine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not the biggest fan of torts

[clémence · Rating 2 out of 5]

good railroad representation

[Emma Heintz]

moral of the story: if you’re stupid and/or slip on a banana peel, you can probably sue

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

“you stink to me”

[Ke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though this is the only Torts casebook I read, compared to other casebooks, I found the notes § too inconsistent. While some notes explained in detail, others just provided a laundry list of cases.

[Catie Choi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can’t escape torts

[Laney]

poor mrs palsgraf

[Alexandra · Rating 4 out of 5]

loved the banana cases

[Annie Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

My favorite case was the one where the woman thought her car could fly like batman and so she gunned it into an incoming car and was thrown from her vehicle

[Haley Grothaus · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read enough of this to put this here

[Lisa Ward · Rating 3 out of 5]

not a fan but the cases were short

[Brinn Hammond · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loled often but end fell off a bit

[Saba Rehman · Rating 3 out of 5]

dnf

[Alexa Zysman · Rating 3 out of 5]

closed book exam. that’s all I’ll say

[Alyssa Lee Lakey · Rating 3 out of 5]

For what I paid for my law school books and for the time I spent hunched over these... you can bet I'm adding them to my Goodreads.

[Courtney · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are some pretty outdated cases, but also some pretty good ones. However, the Notes & Questions sections bothered me. Sometimes they would ask a hypothetical and then give the answer with cases as examples, and other times they wouldn't answer it at all. There were some other consistency issues with it as well, but overall it was fine.