Brother Maynard drafting

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Repetitive, reflexive torture of the English language that flails around, occupies space, but fails to get anywhere.

Like most commercial legal drafting, really.

Named after the passage from the Book of Armaments, the famous apocrypha referenced only in the devotional motion picture Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

Friar (reading from the book of Armaments): AND Saint Attila raised the hand-grenade up on high, saying, “O LORD, bless this Thy hand grenade that with it Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits, in Thy mercy.”

AND the LORD did grin and the people did feast upon the lambs and sloths and carp and anchovies and orangutans and breakfast cereals, and fruit bats and large chu...

Brother Maynard: “Skip a bit, brother.”

Friar: AND the LORD spake, saying:

FIRST shalt thou take out the Holy Pin

THEN shalt thou count to THREE.

NO more, no less.

THREE shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be THREE.

FOUR shalt thou not count, neither count thou TWO

EXCEPTING that thou then proceed to THREE.

FIVE is right out.

Brother Maynard holds up a hand.

Friar: ONCE the number THREE, being the THIRD number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy holy hand-grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it."

Here is some Brother Maynard drafting. Real-life example, though anonymised:

This Agreement, and all Transactions entered into hereunder, will be entered into by the Management Company, acting as manager in respect of each Sub-Fund in respect of a Portfolio (each, a “Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement”), and the Management Company acting as manager in respect of each Sub-Fund in respect of a Portfolio, severally and not jointly, is a separate “Party B”, as more fully described in Section 1 below.

This document will apply to the Transactions entered into between Party A and each Party B under each Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement as if the Management Company acting severally and not jointly in respect of such Sub-Fund in respect of a Portfolio had executed a separate Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement naming only itself as Party B, and that no other Fund listed in the Annex to the Agreement shall have any liability under this document for the obligations of any other Fund so listed. This document is produced in the form of a single physical document for convenience only. Each reference to a “Master Agreement” and “Agreement” will be construed as a reference to each separate Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement between Party A and each Party B, and each Party B will separately be deemed to have entered into a Master Agreement with Party A on the terms set out herein.

Party A acknowledges and agrees that its recourse against Party B in respect of claims and liabilities arising from the relevant Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement is limited to the assets of the Sub-Fund party to that Sub-Portfolio Master Agreement and (as described below in Section 3 (Limited Recourse) to which the relevant claim(s) relate(s) and Party A shall have no recourse to any other assets of the Fund or any other Funds in respect of such relevant claim(s)

See also

• Monty Python and the Holy Grail
  • Stay here and make sure he doesn’t leave
  • Book of Armaments
  • Brother Maynard drafting