AG Harmon

School

  • Columbus School of Law
  • Expertise

  • Written and Oral Argument
  • Logic/Philosophy
  • Legal Scholarship
  • A.G. Harmon received his J.D. from The University of Tennessee, his M.A. from The University of New Hampshire, and his Ph.D. in English from The Catholic University of America. He practiced at Dearborn and Ewing Attorneys in Nashville, Tennessee.

    In addition to legal writing, he has taught classes in Jurisprudence, Law and Literature, Advanced Legal Research and Writing, Law Journal Writing, and Law Journal Editing, and the plays of Shakespeare.

    A nominee for The Pushcart Prize in the essay, he was a 1998-1999 Richard Weaver Graduate Fellow, winner of the 1995 Glen Writers Fellowship, received the 1994 Milton Center Postgraduate Writing Fellowship, and was a Walter E. Dakin Fellow at the Sewanee Writers' Conference in 2003. His novel, A House All Stilled (The University of Tennessee Press 2002), was awarded The Peter Taylor Prize for the Novel in 2002, and was nominated for the Virginia Literary Prize and the Pen-Hemingway Award. His novel Fortnight, was the runner-up for The William Faulkner Prize for the Novel in 2007. His short fiction, essays, and criticism have appeared in The Shenandoah Review, The Antioch Review, Triquarterly, Image, The St. Katherine Review, The Bellingham Review, and Commonweal, among others. A book on the law in Shakespeare—Eternal Bonds, True Contracts: Law and Nature in Shakespeare's Problem Plays—was published by State University of New York Press in 2004. Two textbooks on client representation, The Complete Advocate: A Practice File for Representing Clients from Beginning to End, and The Complete Advocate II: Employment Offenses in Health Care Contexts, have been published by LexisNexis Publications.


    Research and Writing

    PUBLICATIONS AND PAPERS: LEGAL

    “’Should’ or ‘Must’?: Distinguishing Mandates from Guidelines in Tort Claims Contexts,” volume 118, West Virginia Law Review, Spring 2016.
     
    Online Course for Legal Drafting for International Lawyers, Legal Education International, (forthcoming, summer 2016).


    Legal Drafting for International Lawyers, Legal Education International, (forthcoming summer 2015); text, teacher’s manual, PowerPoint presentations, and online course.

    History, Poetry, and Law: Examining the Merchant of Venice: panelist, The Catholic University of America, April 26, 2014.

    “Interested, but not Injured: The Compromised Status of Qui Tam Plaintiffs Under the Amended False Claims Act and the Return of the Citizen Suit,” Public Contract Bar Journal, vol. 34, no. 3 (Spring 2014), 423–466.

    The Complete Advocate II: Employment Offenses in Health Care Contexts: A Practice File for Representing Clients from Beginning to End, LexisNexis Publications (2013).

    Brendan Brown Lecture: Constitutional Challenges: Religious Liberty and the HHS Mandate, The Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America, October 3, 2012.

    “Bounty Hunters and Whistleblowers: Constitutional Concerns for False Claims Actions after Passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010”; American University Journal of Labor and Employment Law Forum, vol. 2, Issue 1, 2011.

    “Defamation in Good Faith: An Argument for Restating the Defense of Qualified Privilege,” Defense Law Journal, vol. 61, No. 2, May 2012, (reprint of article first appearing in Barry Law Review, Vol. 16, pp. 27-56, Spring 2011).

    The Complete Advocate: A Practice File for Representing Clients from Beginning to End, LexisNexis Publications (2010).

    “Lawyering Outside Lawsuits: Incorporating Negotiations, Settlements, and Mediations into the Legal Writing Curriculum,” with Olivia Farrar, Ph.D. Perspectives: Teaching Legal Res. & Writing, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 42-51, 2010.

    “Honor Killings or Patriarchal Crimes”: The Stoning of Soraya M., The Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America, March 2011; speaker.

    “Weighing Medical Judgments: Explaining Evidentiary Preferences for Treating Physician Opinions in ERISA Cases after Black & Decker Disability Plan v. Nord, with Roy F. Harmon, III, Michigan State Law School Journal of Medicine and Law, Vol. 13, No. 2 (2009), pp. 157-186.

    “‘Knights of the Border Land’: Errantry in Fiction of the American Frontier” (paper presented at Southern Association of Law Schools Conference, Summer 2008).

    “‘Back From Wonderland: A Linguistic Approach to Duties Arising from Threats of Physical Violence”; Capital University Law Review, vol. 37, no. 1, Fall 2008.

    “Blood Conscience: Tensions between Moral and Legal Culpability in the stories of Andre Dubus,” (paper presented at Southern Association of Law Schools Conference, Summer 2007).

    “’Slender Knowledge’: Sovereignty, Madness, and the Self in Shakespeare’s King Lear,” Journal of Law, Culture, and the Humanities, vol. 4, No. 3, 2008.

    “The Law in Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night,” paper presented at symposium on “American Exceptionalism: Law and Literature,” Oxford University, Regent’s Park College, Oxford, England, January, 2006.

    “Lawful Deeds: The Entitlements of Marriage in Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well,” selected for reprint in Shakespearean Criticism (1960-present day), Thompson Gale Publishers (2006).

    Eternal Bonds, True Contracts: Law and Nature in Shakespeare’s Problem Plays, State University of New York Press (2004).

    “Sacrifice in the Public Square: Ciceronian Rhetoric in More’s Utopia and the Ultimate Ends of Counsel,” Cardozo Studies in Law and Literature, Fall/Winter 2003.

    “Shakespeare and the Law of the Renaissance,” paper presented to Thomas More Society of America, May, 2003.

    “Concepts of Justice in Shakespeare's Problem Plays,” College English Association-MAG Spring 1997 Conference.

    “Lawful Deeds: The Entitlements of Marriage in Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well,” Logos, Fall/Winter, 2001.

    PUBLICATIONS AND PAPERS: NON-LEGAL

    Some Bore Gifts: Stories, short story collection, Word Galaxy Press, 2017.

    “Bullets in a Debutante’s Bag,” essay forthcoming Mississippi Magazine, December 2017.

    “Cry Melodies,” BioLogos Foundation Grant Winner for Essay, http://www.patheos.com/blogs/ goodletters/2015/11/cry-melodies/

    “The Science of Play,” BioLogos Foundation Grant Winner for Essay, http://www.patheos.com/blogs/ goodletters/2015/06/the-science-and-sundayness-of-play/

    “Beauty’s Victory,” BioLogos Foundation Grant Winner for Essay, http://www.patheos.com /blogs/goodletters/2014/04/beautys-victory.

    “For Your Listening Pleasure,” short story, The Antioch Review, vol. 71, no. 2, Spring 2013.

    “Form,” essay, part of symposium issue on “The Word-Soaked World,” in Image, No. 75, Winter 2013.

    “What They Left,” short story, The Literary Lawyer, Summer 2012; (reprint of story first appearing in The Bellingham Review, Volume XXIX, 57:1, Spring 2006).

    “Good Letters”: The Image Blog: Bi-Monthly Contributor since 2008 of reviews, essays, cultural criticism. www.imagejournal.org.

    “In Nomine,” essay included in anthology: The Best Spiritual Writing of 2012, Penguin, 2011 (first published in Image,No. 66, Summer 2010).

    “Some Bore Gifts,” short story, Shenandoah, vol. 61, No. 1, 2011.

    “Cameo,” short story, St. Katherine Review; Winter 2011.

    “In Nomine,” essay, Image, No. 66, Summer 2010.

    “Perfect Silence,” short story, The Antioch Review, Vol. 68, No. 2 , Spring 2010.

    “Portraits of the Sonata: Desire and Transformation in Modern European Cinema,” essay, Image, No. 61, Spring 2009.

    “Native Language,” short story, The Antioch Review, Vol. 66, No. 3, Summer 2008.

    “The Mass of Virtue,” essay, Image, No. 58, Spring 2008.

    Review of Niall Williams’ John, Commonweal, Spring 2008.

    “A Thing of Beauty,” short story, Triquarterly, Issue 129, Winter 2008.

    “In the Deepest Dark,” review, Commonweal, Summer 2008.

    “Still Life and Matisse,” review, Commonweal, February 23, 2007, volume CXXXIV, No. 4.

    “On Seeing,” review, Commonweal, April 7, 2006, Volume CXXXIII, Number 7.

    “Doubting Thomas,” review, Commonweal, January 27, 2006, Vol. CXXXIII, Number 2.

    “Current Literature,” review, Commonweal, June 17, 2005, Vol. CXXXII, Number 12.

    “What They Left,” short story, The Bellingham Review, Volume XXIX, 57:1, Spring 2006.

    “Gilead,” review, Image, vol. 45 (spring 2005).

    “Shakespeare’s Carved Saints,” article, Studies in English Literature (Spring 2005).

    “Raising the Near Dead,” review, Books and Culture, July/August 2004.

    A House All Stilled, a novel, winner of The Peter Taylor Prize, University of Tennessee Press, 2002

    Novel Excerpt: From A House all Stilled, Crux: A Literary Journal, 2003.

    “Of Time and Form: The Art of William Christenberry,” essay, Image, 2002.

    “‘A Pair of Carved Saints’: Shakespeare’s Richard II and Thomas A ’Becket,” Shakespeare and the History Play, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, England, 2002.

    “The Ignatian Exercises,” story presented at Contemporary Literature Conference, Seattle Pacific University, October 2000.

    “Ordered Chaos: Three Films by Paul Thomas Anderson,” essay, Image, Fall 2000.

    “Faith and Doubt in Contemporary Southern Literature,” Symposium Presenter, Millsaps College, November 1999.

    “Fiction at the End of the Century,” Image, Spring 1999.

    Interview with Pulitzer Prize Winner Oscar Hijuelos, Image, Spring 1999.

    “The Case of Edith Stein,” chapter, Things in Heaven and Earth, ed. H. Fickett, Paraclete Press, 1998.

    Deep River, review, Image, Fall 1996.

    Interview with novelist Doris Betts, Image, Summer 1995.

    "Eyes to See," short story, Image, Winter 1995.

    HONORS 

    2017 Mary, Mirror of Justice Award: Columbus School of Law at The Catholic University of America
    2015 “Beauty’s Victory,”; “The Science of Play,”; “Cry Melodies”: BioLogos Foundation Grant Winner
    2007 Honoree: Writer’s Series University of Evansville, Evansville Indiana
    2007 William Faulkner-William Wisdom Award for the Novel, Runner-up: Fortnight
    2005 2005 William Faulkner-William Wisdom Award for the Novel, Runner-up: A Lifetime
    2005 Tobias Wolff Short Fiction Award, Runner-up, “What They Left”
    2003 Nominee: Virginia Literary Prize
    2004 Fan Mayall Gates Reading, Seattle Pacific University: Honoree
    Pen-Bingham Fellowship for Writers, 2004: Nominee
    The Peter Taylor Prize for the Novel, 2001: A House All Stilled
    Pen-Hemingway Award for the Novel, 2003: Nominee
    Sewanee Writers’ Conference: 2003 Walter E. Dakin Fellowship in
    The Pushcart Prize: Nominee, 1999, 2000, 2003
    The Richard Weaver Fellowship: 1998-1999
    The Milton Center Fellowship for the Novel-in-Progress: 1994
    The Thomas Williams Short Story Award: 1993