“The first thing we do is, let’s teach all the lawyers,” said St. Louis County Circuit Judge Stanley J. Wallach, riffing on the famous line from William Shakespeare’s play, “Henry VI, Part 2.” Wallach, who has been on the trial bench for eight years, has a passion for both the law and the works of The Bard. He studied Shakespeare during his undergraduate studies at Duke University, where he also acted in a number of plays produced by the Duke Drama Department. After graduating, he moved to Washington, D.C., living near the Folger Shakespeare Library. Wallach had a very brief professional acting career in D.C. but decided that a pivot to the stage of the courtroom was a more sensible career path. So, he applied to law school.

At the University of Chicago Law School, Judge Wallach was introduced to the academic field of law and literature. He studied under Judge Richard Posner of the Seventh Circuit, author of countless books, including Law and Literature, the only comprehensive book-length treatment of the field. In Posner’s course, Wallach analyzed such Shakespeare works as “Hamlet” and “The Merchant of Venice.” He was hooked.

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