Publication of the week:

PROFESSOR BARRY HOUGH

Monday 15 March 2010

Barry Hough & Howard Davis, Coleridge's Laws: A Study of Coleridge in Malta (Cambridge: OpenBook Publishers, 2010). xxviii + 365 pp. ISBN: 978-1-906924-12-6.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge is best known as a great poet and literary theorist. His fascinating life, which was marred by drug addiction, has been carefully studied. Less attention has been paid to the episode in his life when he served as an official in Malta, drafting proclamations and public notices as a member of the staff of the British Civil Commissioner.

In Coleridge's Laws Barry Hough and Howard Davis offer the first full description and analysis of Coleridge's effect on the law, the constitution, and the life of the people in Malta at the onset of the 19th century. They use newly discovered archival materials and also, for the first time, publish translations of the laws and public notices drafted by Coleridge. The book reveals that Coleridge was complicit in various acts of the Government that were not only inconsistent with the rule of law but also constitute a disturbing departure from the idealism Coleridge had espoused before taking office.

Contents:

Introduction by Michael John Kooy
The Journey to Valletta
The Political, Social and Economic Condition of Malta
The Maltese Constitution
The Laws and Public Notices
An Assessment of the Laws and Public Notices
Conclusion
The Laws and Public Notices (translated from Italian by Lydia Davis)

Barry Hough taught as a lecturer in the Law School at the University of Buckingham 1983-1989, and has returned in a part-time capacity to teach Constitutional and Administrative Law. Most recently he was Professor of English Law and Deputy Dean (Research and Enterprise) in the Business School at Bournemouth University as well as Director of the Centre for Legal Studies. In addition to the public law subjects, he has teaching and research interests in employment law.