The Law and Practice of International Courts and Tribunals 9 (2010) 405–407 brill.nl/lape Shabtai Rosenne (24 November 1917–21 September 2010) A Personal Reflection For more than fifty years, Shabtai Rosenne came to the Netherlands to have his manuscripts published by Sijthoff and Nijhoff, respectively. In this endeavour he was assisted by quite a number of different publishers, among them Ronald M. Goodman and Alan D. Stephens. I had the great privilege to work with Shabtai as (one of) his publisher(s) from 1987 until 2006 and like so many of us, I continued my friendship with Shabtai until his death on 21 September 2010. One of my first encounters with Shabtai was when he visited the pub- lishers’ offices in Dordrecht. We were instructed in advance to be witty and entertaining during our “brown bag luncheon”, but we were all a bit intim- idated. This was not at all necessary, the lunch was very animated and Shabtai entertained us all. One of my first tasks at Nijhoff was the publication ofInternational Law at a Time of Perplexity: Essays in Honour of Shabtai Rosenne, edited by Pro- fessor Yoram Dinstein and Dr Mala Tabory. It was published on the occa- sion of Shabtai’s seventieth birthday and contains fifty-five contributions by eminent scholars and practitioners in the field of international law. It was also one of the first publications of which the manuscript was prepared through a “desktop” in-house publishing process. It was an experiment, but the experiment involved fifty-five demanding authors, which was not an easy task. Shabtai had had a clear say in the title, and more specifically in the use of the word “perplexity”. We see this word again in the title of his general course for The Hague Academy of International Law in 2001: The Perplexities of Modern International Law. The liber amicorum contains wonderful gems of articles, a reflection of Shabtai’s many interests: the International Court of Justice, the codifica- tion of international law, the law of treaties, the law of the sea, and the law © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2010 DOI: 10.1163/157180310X541095 Rosenboom / 406 The Law and Practice of International Courts and Tribunals 9 (2010) 405–407 of Israel, Jewish law and related matters. The variety of authors reflects the many different facets of Shabtai’s career.1 In 1997, on the occasion of the publication of the third edition of The Law and Practice of the International Court, 1920–1996, Shabtai hosted a dinner in New York, on the one hand for his friends in international law, and on the other for his relatives living in New York. It was a very nice evening. On the occasion of the publication of volume 6 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982 in 2002 (the twentieth anniversary of the adoption and the opening for signature of the conven- tion), we travelled again to New York to present a copy of the book to the United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, and to the Permanent Representative of the United States to the United Nations, Ambassador Negroponte. In 2002, the first issue of this journal,The Law and Practice of Interna- tional Courts and Tribunals: a Practitioners’ Journal, was published. In between the different editions, Shabtai would submit updates toThe Law and Practice of the International Court and other contributions. He was a very supportive member of the Editorial Board. Shabtai received quite a number of honorary memberships and prizes. I wish to mention two in particular. In 2004, Shabtai was the first recipient of The Hague Prize of International Law – an initiative of the late Judge Ronald St. John Macdonald, who proposed its institution to the mayor of The Hague. The prize was bestowed on Shabtai in recognition of his great merits both in the field of the formation and the study of international law and it was a highlight in his career. He was accompanied to The Hague by his daughter-in-law, Zippi Rosenne, and they both very much enjoyed the festivities surrounding this award. He was given the Onassis Distinguished Scholar Award in 2007. This high honour was made possible by a grant from the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation to the Rhodes Academy of Oceans Law and Policy. He was selected to receive this award because of his many contributions to the Rhodes Academy itself and because of his life-long career of distinguished accomplishments in pro- moting the rule of law in the world’s oceans. In 2006, the new edition of The Law and Practice of the International Court, 1920–2005, Fourth Edition was published. Shabtai was then assisted 1) See for his extensive biography and bibliography Volume 291 of the Collected Courses of the Hague Academy of International Law..