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Best books, favourite films, top tracks and an essential: Counsel invites barristers to share their cultural influences. In this issue, we talk to criminal barrister Tony Wyatt, who also writes as Tony Kent
The book that had the greatest influence on me is not the best I’ve read, but it changed my life. David Baldacci was a lawyer in Washington DC when he published his first novels and The Winner – which I read aged 18 – was fast-paced and gripping and exactly my kind of read. But it was the biography on the back page which had most impact on me. Until then I was torn between two careers. That bio made me realise I could be both a barrister and a writer (although the ‘writer’ part has taken a little longer than 18-year-old me might have expected!)
In terms of great books, my all-time favourite is Joseph Heller’s Catch 22. Defying easy description, it reads like an insight into the mind of an unstable genius. Brilliantly written. Utterly original. Absolutely hilarious; it remains the only writing to make me burst into loud laughter on the Tube! The fact that life at the criminal Bar increasingly resembles life in the 256th Squadron is, of course, purely coincidental…
I still remember being asked during a pupillage interview: ‘What is your favourite film?’ Wanting to create a good impression, I lied and said The Shawshank Redemption. It’s a very good film, but not my favourite. The reaction I received was unexpected: all eyes thrown to the ceiling. It didn’t take any fine forensic skills to know it was a poor answer. A few chambers later, I was interviewed by 2 Bedford Row. The same question was asked. I bit the bullet and told the truth: ‘Superman I & II, watched back to back as one movie.’ I hastened to add the nostalgic explanation for this, which must have deflected the inevitable incredulity as they gave me a pupillage and then a tenancy.
Finally trusted to sit on pupillage interviews, I asked the same question and discovered that every single answer was indeed… The Shawshank Redemption! Seems it was the safe choice: obvious quality, universally liked, based around crime and punishment. The moral of the story: if you’re asked that question, even if Shawshank actually is your favourite, say something else!
I was, yes, and I believe I owe boxing for much of my life. As a boy I lived and breathed the sport. Instead of going out and getting myself into trouble like so many others from my background – including my older brother, whose robbery trial as a teenager was where I watched the cross-examination that first made me aspire to a career at the Bar – I was training in the boxing club or fighting in the ring. I also later discovered that boxing earned me a pupillage interview; with so many applicants for four places, the committee looked for something that stood out in otherwise identikit applications. In my intake they found three such features: one of us was a boxer, one had been in the Israeli Army and the third had been a fire-eating barman.
My musical tastes are the subject of much justified derision. If I have a musical inspiration it’s Bruce Springsteen; every book and script I write starts out with a Springsteen number as its working title. None of his songs, however, hits me like The Book of Love by Peter Gabriel. Quite simply, it’s the song to which my wife and I had our first dance at our wedding. And that puts it ahead of every other.
It must be St Peter’s Basilica. Literally awe-inspiring; the only building to leave me speechless. I made the mistake of visiting the Basilica before the Sistine Chapel, and as a result I couldn’t see what was so special about the latter. It takes something extraordinary to have that effect.
My laptop. Killer Intent took a long time to write, completed in spare moments between trials or during train journeys. My second novel – Marked for Death – took three months. The difference? A three-month trial in Bristol. Four nights a week in a hotel room provides the perfect, distraction-free opportunity to write. What a disaster it would be if I were stuck there without a laptop.
Tony Kent’s novel Killer Intent was published by Elliott & Thompson in January 2018. It opens with an apparently botched assassination attempt in Trafalgar Square and grows into a life or death chase across the Capital and into Ireland, as an intelligence agent, an ambitious journalist and a barrister with a secret past search for answers while fighting to stay alive.
The book that had the greatest influence on me is not the best I’ve read, but it changed my life. David Baldacci was a lawyer in Washington DC when he published his first novels and The Winner – which I read aged 18 – was fast-paced and gripping and exactly my kind of read. But it was the biography on the back page which had most impact on me. Until then I was torn between two careers. That bio made me realise I could be both a barrister and a writer (although the ‘writer’ part has taken a little longer than 18-year-old me might have expected!)
In terms of great books, my all-time favourite is Joseph Heller’s Catch 22. Defying easy description, it reads like an insight into the mind of an unstable genius. Brilliantly written. Utterly original. Absolutely hilarious; it remains the only writing to make me burst into loud laughter on the Tube! The fact that life at the criminal Bar increasingly resembles life in the 256th Squadron is, of course, purely coincidental…
I still remember being asked during a pupillage interview: ‘What is your favourite film?’ Wanting to create a good impression, I lied and said The Shawshank Redemption. It’s a very good film, but not my favourite. The reaction I received was unexpected: all eyes thrown to the ceiling. It didn’t take any fine forensic skills to know it was a poor answer. A few chambers later, I was interviewed by 2 Bedford Row. The same question was asked. I bit the bullet and told the truth: ‘Superman I & II, watched back to back as one movie.’ I hastened to add the nostalgic explanation for this, which must have deflected the inevitable incredulity as they gave me a pupillage and then a tenancy.
Finally trusted to sit on pupillage interviews, I asked the same question and discovered that every single answer was indeed… The Shawshank Redemption! Seems it was the safe choice: obvious quality, universally liked, based around crime and punishment. The moral of the story: if you’re asked that question, even if Shawshank actually is your favourite, say something else!
I was, yes, and I believe I owe boxing for much of my life. As a boy I lived and breathed the sport. Instead of going out and getting myself into trouble like so many others from my background – including my older brother, whose robbery trial as a teenager was where I watched the cross-examination that first made me aspire to a career at the Bar – I was training in the boxing club or fighting in the ring. I also later discovered that boxing earned me a pupillage interview; with so many applicants for four places, the committee looked for something that stood out in otherwise identikit applications. In my intake they found three such features: one of us was a boxer, one had been in the Israeli Army and the third had been a fire-eating barman.
My musical tastes are the subject of much justified derision. If I have a musical inspiration it’s Bruce Springsteen; every book and script I write starts out with a Springsteen number as its working title. None of his songs, however, hits me like The Book of Love by Peter Gabriel. Quite simply, it’s the song to which my wife and I had our first dance at our wedding. And that puts it ahead of every other.
It must be St Peter’s Basilica. Literally awe-inspiring; the only building to leave me speechless. I made the mistake of visiting the Basilica before the Sistine Chapel, and as a result I couldn’t see what was so special about the latter. It takes something extraordinary to have that effect.
My laptop. Killer Intent took a long time to write, completed in spare moments between trials or during train journeys. My second novel – Marked for Death – took three months. The difference? A three-month trial in Bristol. Four nights a week in a hotel room provides the perfect, distraction-free opportunity to write. What a disaster it would be if I were stuck there without a laptop.
Tony Kent’s novel Killer Intent was published by Elliott & Thompson in January 2018. It opens with an apparently botched assassination attempt in Trafalgar Square and grows into a life or death chase across the Capital and into Ireland, as an intelligence agent, an ambitious journalist and a barrister with a secret past search for answers while fighting to stay alive.
Best books, favourite films, top tracks and an essential: Counsel invites barristers to share their cultural influences. In this issue, we talk to criminal barrister Tony Wyatt, who also writes as Tony Kent
Sam Townend KC explains the Bar Council’s efforts towards ensuring a bright future for the profession
Giovanni D’Avola explores the issue of over-citation of unreported cases and the ‘added value’ elements of a law report
Louise Crush explores the key points and opportunities for tax efficiency
Westgate Wealth Management Ltd is a Partner Practice of FTSE 100 company St. James’s Place – one of the top UK Wealth Management firms. We offer a holistic service of distinct quality, integrity, and excellence with the aim to build a professional and valuable relationship with our clients, helping to provide them with security now, prosperity in the future and the highest standard of service in all of our dealings.
Is now the time to review your financial position, having reached a career milestone? asks Louise Crush
If you were to host a dinner party with 10 guests, and you asked them to explain what financial planning is and how it differs to financial advice, you’d receive 10 different answers. The variety of answers highlights the ongoing need to clarify and promote the value of financial planning.
On the 50th anniversary of the pub bombings, even now it is still unresolved. Chris Mullin, the journalist and former MP who led the campaign leading to the release of the Birmingham Six, looks back at events
Adele Akers’ reflections on health and wellbeing support at the very junior end of the Bar
Not one to say, ‘I told you so,’ Sam Thomas continues his cyber series with the key learnings from the major supply chain attack affecting 80 law firms and at least one set of chambers at the end of 2023
One year on and the Court of Appeal fails to quash convictions after receiving evidence of racism in the jury room, and there are still no revisions to the Equal Treatment Bench Book , says Keir Monteith KC
Increasing sophistication and frequency of attacks have led many chambers to ask ‘when’ not ‘if’ they will suffer a cyber incident. Simon Davis sets out the factors to consider when renewing your cyber cover