Fun With Legal Documents

So, I was checking out Newsarama, as usual, and I saw an article titled "ELLISON SUES FANTAGRAPHICS." In the article is a link to the complaint filed in Los Angeles, which I simply had to read.

It's much more entertaining than I thought it would be. Here are some of my favorite parts:

Paragraph 1

"Harlan Ellison, a Los Angeles resident, is a famous author, screenwriter, commentator and public speaker."

". . . known publicly as the writer of some of the best loved original Star Trek and Out Limits episodes."
'
". . . Ellison is a well-know fearless champion of artist's rights . . ."

Paragraph 2

"Fantagraphics is a tiny but hostile publishing outfit which both men, Goth and Thompson, run out of their shared home in Seattle."

Paragraph 4

"The interview was characteristically candid, and Ellison provided Goth with a long, controversial and gripping piece."

Paragraph 5

"Specifically, for example, Ellison suggested one would have to be a 'derange-o' and/or 'bugfuck' to write like Fleisher."

Paragraph 6

"These offhanded if provocative remarks were quite clearly non-actionable 'opinions' about Fleisher's writing and its laudable literary origins . . ."

Paragraph 7

"...to have it made plain in the courtroom hallway that it was Ellison's contribution that had saved Groth from a large damage award proved too much for the immature and now furious Groth to bear."

Paragraph 8

"In most regards Groth has been cowardly about his 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned' routine with Ellison . . ."

Paragraph 9

"Groth's First Big Lie"

Paragraph 10

"However, Groth did not reveal this fact to Ellison and Groth continued to receive and happily spend check from Ellison for his own selfish purposes."

Paragraph 14

"These defamatory remarks demonstrate a fecklessness clearly intended to trash Ellison's fifty year long honorable and distinguished career."

"All appeals to the defendants to cease and desist, to retract and correct . . . were met with arrogance, insult, threats, or silence."

Paragraph 15 takes a huge shift in writing style and tone. Suddenly it's in legalese.

Now I don't know much, if anything, about the feud between Fantagraphics and Ellison and I do think he's written some excellent Science Fiction in his life time, but I still think some of the "fun" from a legal document should be shared.

I'm not the first and I won't be the last to throw this around the blogohedron, but the farther it goes, the funnier it'll get.