E-Book Overview
In recent years, there has been a continuing and persistent world-wide interest in the interaction between the two disciplines of law and literature. Although there have been many collections of primary texts that combined these two areas, this volume presents literary analyses and criticism in an attempt to assess the varied relationships between law and justice, between lawyers and clients, and between readers’ perceptions and authors’ intent, hopefully suggesting why they have continually been yoked together. One similarity between the two is that lawyers, like writers, must catch their audience’s attention by novelty of scene, distinctiveness of voice, and ingenuity of design. Furthermore, legal advocates must recreate a concrete sense of reality, developing vivid and valid pictures of a specific time and place. In short, both lawyers and writers attempt to provide a basis for juries / readers to judge defendants / characters by their motivations and their actions and to decide whether a favorable ruling / assessment is justified. Collectively, the essays in this book are designed to deal with themes of guilt and innocence, right and wrong, morality and legality. The essays also suggest that the world as it is delineated by lawyers is indeed a text that like its literary counterparts sometimes blurs the distinction between fact and fiction as it attempts to define "truth" and to establish criteria for "impartial" justice. By exploring interdisciplinary contexts, readers will surely be made more aware, more sensitive to the roles that stories play in the legal profession and to the dilemmas faced by legal systems that often succeed in maintaining the rights and privileges of a dominant societal group at the expense of a less powerful one.
E-Book Content
LITERATURE AND LAW
Rodopi Perspectives on Modern Literature
Edited by David Bevan
LITERATURE AND LAW
Edited by Michael J. Meyer
AMSTERDAM
- NEW YORK, NY 2004
The paper on which this book is printed meets the requirements of " I S 0 9706: 1994, Information and documentation - Paper for documents - Requirements for permanence". ISBN: 90-420-1643-4 (Bound) @Editions Rodopi B.V., Amsterdam - New York, NY 2004 Printed in The Netherlands
CONTENTS
Introduction Retrying The Stranger Again Mary Ann Frese Witt and Eric Witt The Silent Voices of the Law Susan Ayres Law and Order: Exploring the British Legal System in David Hare’s Murmuring Judges Karen C. Blansfield Criminal Apprehensions: Prague Minorities and The Habsburg Legal System in Jaroslav Hašek’s The Good Soldier Švejk and Franz Kafka’s The Trial Jenifer Cushman
vii 1
21
37
51
Silence in the Courtroom: Language, Literature, and Law in The Ballad of Frankie Silver Gwen McNeill Ashburn
67
Representing Lawyers: Edith Wharton’s Portrayal of Lawyers and Lawyering In The Touchstone and Summer Deborah Hecht
83
Ritual Murder and the Corruption of Law in Bernard Malamud’s The Fixer Eric Sterling
99
“How Shall We Change the Law?”: Birth Control Rhetoric and the Modern American Narrative Beth Widmaier Capo
119
vi
Contents
Putting God on Trial: The Relationship of Kaf ka to Leibniz Joseph Suglia
145
Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Live from Death Row as Post-Legal Prison Writing Brian Conniff
159
The Letter of the Law and Canadian Letters: Joy Kogawa’s Obasan Ana María Frailé-Marcos
173
Prior Claims and Sovereign Rights: The Sexual Contract in Edith Wharton’s Summer Alicia Renfroe
193
Situating Atticus in the Zone: A Lawyer and His Daughter Read Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird Nancy Lawson Remler and Hugh Lawson
207
Challenging the Court: Charles Chesn