Sunstein - The World According to Star Wars

I didnt plan to write this book, and if you told me that I was going to, I wouldnt have believed you. The project started less than a year ago, when my wife and I were having dinner at the home of two good friends, Jenna Lyons and Courtney Crangi. As the evening wound down, Courtney casually pointed to an old compact disk containing A New Hope. She said that I should borrow it and show it to my son Declan, then five years old.

I hadnt seen the movie for decades and had no particular desire to see it again. Declan was interested in baseball, not spaceships, and he was a bit young for droids, blasters, and Lord Vader. So showing him the movie seemed pretty doomed. But on a lark (and to be polite to Courtney), I gave it a try. Of course he loved it. I did, too.

After seeing A New Hope, we promptly saw the five others (though just a part of Revenge of the Sith, which is pretty intense). I started to get a bit obsessed. Thanks, Courtney.

For decades, I have invited (okay, begged) law students to help me on research projects, involving such subjects as the Administrative Procedure Act, regulatory reform, the value of a statistical life, and default rules in environmental law. I have always been lucky enough to get a good response, but for this book, the response was unparalleled. In fact it was overwhelming. Special thanks to Declan Conroy, Lauren Ross, and Christopher YoungJedi Knights all.

Heartfelt thanks as well to Jacob Gersen, David Jaher, Martha Nussbaum, L. A. Paul, Richard Thaler, and Adrian Vermeule for comments on all or part of the manuscript. Particular thanks to Vermeule not only for numerous discussions but also for publishing a review-essay on Star Wars in the New Rambler, which he edits; this book grew from that seed. (The essay can be found at http://newramblerreview.com/book-reviews/fiction-literature/how-star-wars-illuminates-constitutional-law-and-authorship.)

Thanks to my terrific agent, Sarah Chalfant, for her support, guidance, and enthusiasm. For this law professor, Star Wars was not exactly a likely topic, and I was genuinely surprised, and remain more than grateful, that Sarah encouraged me to proceed. I am also grateful to members of a reading group I taught at Harvard Law School in the fall of 2015, on the topic of contingency and serendipity. The course wasnt about Star Wars, but the subject did (ummm) come up. I thank as well Tom Pitoniak for an excellent, careful copyedit.

My wife, Samantha Power, is not a huge Star Wars fan, but she saw The Force Awakens with me, and she actually liked it. She has also been generous enough to tolerate countless discussions of Luke, Leia, Obi-Wan, Darth Vader, and all the restand to keep her good cheer while Declan, Rian, and I stared at Episodes on the computer. (If she felt left out, she didnt show it.) Amazingly, shes shared my enthusiasm for this project. Astonishingly, she read an early draft of this book, in full, and she made large-scale suggestions about how to structure it, and also numerous page-by-page edits, which reoriented and greatly improved the manuscript. The Force runs very strong in her family (Anakin-level midi-chlorians, no doubt); I am truly blessed to be part of it.

Julia Cheiffetz was, and is, the best editor ever. Shes brilliantly creative, and shes tremendous fun, and she has vision. Actually shes a bit like George Lucas, in the sense that her standards are really high, and she wont just settle. I am keenly aware that this book is not nearly as good as Julia deservesnot closebut her efforts made it a ton better than it would otherwise be. For whatever works here, shes been my copilot.

My fathers favorite place on earth, I think, was Marblehead, Massachusetts. He adored Preston Beach, and fishing, and tennis, and his children, and soft-serve ice cream, which amazed him. In my entire life, I never saw him angry (not even once). He died in his young sixties; he didnt live long enough to meet my three children. With his big, strong shoulders and unfailing, broad smile, he never got old. He had no Darth Vader in him, and no Kylo Ren, and only a bit of Obi-Wanbut plenty of Han Solo. (He was a great flirt.) When I was a child, he showed me his World War II medalsand while he never gave me a lightsaber, I have those medals now. Thanks, Dad.