Michael Crennan

Michael Crennan taught English Literature in several Australian universities before practising at the Bar. After retiring from the Bar, he completed a PhD at the University of Melbourne; his dissertation dealt with the effect of the Roman historian Tacitus on English political and historical thinkers.

Michael Crennan reviews 'Radical Students: The old left at Sydney University' by Alan Barcan and 'The Diary of a Vice-Chancellor: University of Melbourne' by Raymond Priestly (ed. Ronald Ridley)

December 2002-January 2003, no. 247 • 01 December 2002

Many thousands of undergraduates have walked under the stilts of the Raymond Priestley Building, which forms part of Melbourne University’s great wind tunnel, with no thought of the person commemorated by its name. He was, in fact, a remarkable man. His four years as Vice-Chancellor (1935–38) emerge in extraordinary detail and intimacy, thanks to this edition of his journals. Raymond Priestle ... (read more)

Michael Crennan reviews 'Henry Friendly: Greatest judge of his era' by David M. Dorsen

December 2013–January 2014, no. 357 • 01 December 2013

Henry Friendly was a judge of the highest reputation – greater than Learned Hand in Justice Scalia’s opinion. His output was prodigious, his legacy unmatched: of his fifty-one clerks, twenty-one (including the present incumbent) became justices of the Supreme Court of the United States; in that Court’s decisions, only Learned Hand was cited more often than Friendly. ... (read more)