ABSTRACT
Margaret Brazier writes with a rare combination of great legal knowledge, robust common sense, a refusal to accept anything on trust or on account of its possibly distinguished provenance, a willingness to make her own personal views known without an intolerant disregard for the contrary views, and a welcome sensitivity to the real life tragedies and difficult personal circumstances that must necessarily lie behind and be affected by legal judgments. At bottom, medical law concerns people who are (or who are not but should be) receiving medical treatment or who have suffered in their attempt to be treated. The practice of medicine makes a real difference to how well people’s lives go. The practice of medical law should reflect this basic fact. Brazier’s writing has always been alive to this requirement and it consequently displays real practical wisdom, informed by judgements of what is right that do not derive from the rigid observance of rules and that is also conjoined with a sense of why what is right matters to real flesh and blood human beings.
