Many commentators have observed that last week's trouncing in the High Court of author David Irving's professional reputation -- he is 'a right-wing pro-Nazi polemicist', according to the judge Mr Justice Gray -- was a resounding victory for freedom of speech and a vindication of the much-criticised libel laws.No doubt his humiliating defeat will be greeted with a collective sigh of relief all round the world.

'Our biggest fear was that the libel laws in Britain .

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would help Irving win a moral victory,' said Efraim Zuroff of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Israel.

Up until last week, the American academic Professor Deborah Lipstadt, whose book branded Irving a Holocaust denier, said she thought the laws were not only 'absolutely ludicrous' but also that there was 'something very weird' about them.Perhaps unsurprisingly, she has a slightly more favourable view now.

'I think the system is nuts, but given the nuttiness of that system, [the verdict] showed it at its best,' she says.

After all, she notes that she had her day in court and struck an unprecedented blow against her adversary and the revisionist movement.

She maintains that in the US, the case would have been thrown out because of the 'public figure' defence which puts the burden of proof on high-profile claimants to prove that the defendant knew or was reckless as to what was published was false.At the time of speaking, Prof Lipstadt had only had 24 hours to absorb the damning judgment's 300-odd pages.

She spent much of that time talking to the world's press and sifting through the 700 e-mails and other messages she has received from Holocaust survivors and well-wishers, including a telephone call from Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak.Academic friends had advised the 51-year-old author of Denying the Holocaust to settle out of court or apologise.

Such advice was 'just galling' to hear from her colleagues.

She asked them to draft an apology to David Irving that they would be willing to put their own name to, which acknowledged, for example, that only 100,000 Jews died at Auschwitz or that there were no gas chambers.

There was no option but to pursue the action, she states bluntly.Prof Lipstadt describes hearing the judgement being read out in court as 'an elation'.

'I didn't doubt that we would win, but I never thought we would get such a sweeping settlement, s uch an unequivocal and unreserved condemnation.

I'd hoped for it in my dreams but everyone told me British judges don't do that.'Solicitor-advocate Anthony Julius, a consultant at Mishcon de Reya and junior counsel to the professor, never shared his client's scepticism about the legal system and the judiciary.

'I think the poor old libel laws, which are the subject of endless and often ill-informed attacks, stood up very well,' he contends.He argues that the defence team was 'perfectly happy' to discharge the burden of proof and there seems to be no good reason why defendants should not be prepared -- or 'not be expected', he adds -- to prove the truth of what they have said.

Nor would they have wanted to rely on a US-style public figure defence, he says, because they were clear that what their client had said was true.According to Mr Julius, it would have been a 'weasel' defence which they would not have 'condescended' to even if it were available.

'I say, three cheers to the British libel laws and British libel judges,' he adds.But free speech comes at a price, and there is a legal bill that is reported to be as high as £2.5 million.

It may never be paid if Mr Irving's finances are as perilous as he has been telling the press since the trial.

But that is an argument about the high costs of litigation, not a criticism of the libel laws, says Mr Julius.

Mishcons is not charging for its legal work.Mr Julius claims there were no nerves at the firm on taking on the case, which has assumed major significance over the four years since the writ was issued.

Partner James Libson says the firm took a decision a long time ago that this was a case 'we couldn't lose'.

'We knew that the evidence was so strong we really had eliminated any possibility of losing when we got to the trial.'Kevin Bays, a partner at London media firm Davenport Lyons, which represented the other defendant, Penguin Books, says it was a major commitment by the client.

The firm's fees are approaching £2 million.

He adds that it reflects the company's philosophy that 'sometimes principles are more important than financial considerations'.

It was always going to be a hugely expensive case, Mr Bays explains; the defence team itself had a high burden of proof to overcome, having to establish that the author falsified, manipulated and distorted history deliberately.All the lawyers involved refute the melodramatic assertion often made in the press that it was history or the Holocaust that was on trial in court 36 of the Royal Courts of Justice.

'What we were talking about is the integrity of one man,' says Mr Bays.Anthony Julius points out that every day, courts are the forum for disputes about what happened in the past; but unlike 99% of trials, that was not what happened in this case.

'There was not an inquiry into history, but there was an inquiry into historiography -- the way history is written,' he says.However, his colleague, Mr Libson, adds that historians had been struck by the rigours of the legal process.

Not that it was too constricting, but that it was a demanding process that did well at getting at the truth, he says.Given the harrowing nature of much of the evidence, there were few lighter moments in the 32 days of the trial.

However, there was one moment when Mr Irving mistakenly addressed the judge as 'Mein Fuhrer'.'That was quite a moment,' recalls Prof Lipstadt.

'I never heard 100 people collectively take such a sharp breath as they tried to process what had happened and then break out into laughter.'Did she have any concerns about allo wing her adversary a platform to air his views about the Holocaust? 'Sometimes, you give a fool enough rope and they'll hang themselves,' she says.