The Paper Chase is a 1971 novel written by John Jay Osborn Jr., a 1970 graduate of Harvard Law School. The book tells the story of Hart, a first-year law student at Harvard, and his experiences with Professor Charles Kingsfield, a brilliant and demanding contracts instructor whom he both idolizes and finds incredibly intimidating. The novel inspired an eponymous 1973 film and then a television series, which ran from 1978 to 1979 and from 1983 to 1986. Osborn wrote the novel as a third-year student at Harvard Law School. William Alfred, a Harvard humanities professor and playwright, coached him in writing the book. Plot The story centers on Hart, a young law student from Minnesota who attends Harvard Law School and becomes obsessed with one of his teachers, Professor Charles W. Kingsfield Jr. Hart becomes an expert on Kingsfield's subject, contracts; he reads everything about the subject, including all of Kingsfield's papers, most of which are not on the reading list. He goes so far as to break into the law library to read Kingsfield's original law school notes. Hart becomes such an expert that Kingsfield asks him to contribute to a paper. At the same time, he begins a relationship with Susan Field, who turns out to be Kingsfield's daughter. Susan stands aloof from the law school rat race and dismisses all the things Hart cares about most. After much effort preparing for final exams, Hart's grades are delivered to him, but he simply makes a paper airplane out of the envelope, and sends it sailing into the Atlantic Ocean without looking at it. Professor Charles W. Kingsfield Jr Professor Charles W. Kingsfield Jr. is one of the key characters in the novel, film and television series. Kingsfield is an imperious, highly respected (and feared) professor of contracts at Harvard Law School, known for his unrelenting use of the Socratic method on his students. Kingsfield was a law student at Harvard, as shown by the presence of his own class notes in the institution's archives. Kingsfield has a daughter with a fiercely independent personality. During an event at Harvard Law School to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the book's release, Osborn said that the character was a composite of several of his professors at Harvard Law School, saying, "It wasn't like it was hard to find role models." Many Harvard Law graduates believe the character to be a composite