Why does Sir William Blackstone continue to be relevant in the twenty-first century? He is in many ways a quintessential eighteenth century figure. Yet his reputation (and the number of citations of his Commentaries on the Laws of England) in the highest appellate courts of common law countries is high, and growing. As long as his works remain relevant to the determination of the law of these great jurisdictions, legal scholarly interest in Blackstone will remain justified – purely historical interest is likely to be perennial. There has been something of an explosion of scholarship on Blackstone and his Commentaries in the past decade, led by Professor Wilfrid Prest at the University of Adelaide. We have seen a biography of Blackstone by Prest (2008), the publication of a variorum edition of the Commentaries by Oxford University Press under the general editorship of Prest (2016), two volumes of essays curated by Prest – Blackstone and his Commentaries: Biography, Law, History (2009), Re-Interpreting Blackstone’s Commentaries: A Seminal Text in National and International Contexts (2014) – and now this book, co-edited by Anthony Page and Prest: Blackstone and His Critics (2018).

中文翻译：

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黑石和他的批评者

为什么威廉·布莱克斯通爵士在 21 世纪仍然具有重要意义？从很多方面来说，他都是一个典型的 18 世纪人物。然而，他在普通法国家最高上诉法院的声誉（以及他的《英格兰法律评论》的引用次数）很高，而且还在不断增长。只要他的作品仍然与这些重要司法管辖区的法律确定相关，对 Blackstone 的法律学术兴趣将仍然是合理的——纯粹的历史兴趣很可能是长期存在的。在阿德莱德大学的 Wilfrid Perst 教授的带领下，过去 10 年里，关于 Blackstone 及其评论的奖学金呈爆炸式增长。我们看过 Perst (2008) 的 Blackstone 传记，