Subjects:

Biographies and Legal Humour

Contents:

The beginning

my father and his family

my grandparents

my mother

my father's work

my parents together

my sister

the early years

the twenties

clouds

flight

Switzerland

an interlude - ""fast forward""

to France

Paris - the beginning

Lycee Michelet

the Fizaines (and others)

Paris - the second year

to Nice

our parents in London

the end of the Lycee de Nice

the promised land

Aldenham

the first year

1937

1938-1939

the final end of Nice

the phoney war - Cambridge

the real war starts

internment

reactions

the Isle of Man

release

another interlude - ""fast forward""

the Blitz - back to Aldenham - the RAF

air crew cadet

wings

learning to teach flying

flying instructor back in Cambridge

twin engines

joining a Wellington crew

twin engines

612 Squadron

the war in Europe ends

demobilisation

post-war Cambridge

1946

1947

Michele

going to the Bar

my mother leaves

my father's death

a postscript

beginnings at the Bar

marriage, etc

my mother in Germany

a painful family reunion

my mother's death

end of a generation

the second half

the junior Bar

silk

some highlights

towards the end of the Bar

the Bench?

life as a judge

separation

the Law Commission

Diana

the Court of Appeal

disappointments

a new profession

a resurrection

epilogue

annexe - the Macao Sardine Case.

In the first part of his memoir, the author reveals his family history and his Germanic roots. His father, Alfred Kerr, was a well-known drama critic and intellectual, whose writings were widely known throughout Germany during the Weimar Republic. As Jews, the Kerrs were forced to flee their homeland before the outbreak of World War II, but the author tells of a predominantly happy childhood spent in such varied places as Germany, Switzerland, France and England.

Kerr's memoirs also tell of his years at Aldenham and Cambridge and his assimilation into the English way of life. They also relate the story of his internment as an ""enemy alien"" during the early years of World War II and of his subsequent service as a crack pilot for the Royal Air Force. After the war, the author returned to Cambridge to finish his law degree. He was subsequently urged to go to the Bar.

The final chapters of this autobiography are devoted to chronicling the author's glittering legal career as a leading commercial silk and, ultimately, Judge of Appeals.