Literature and the Human Substance of Law
Author : Robert Ginsberg
Keywords : absurdity, aesthetics, Allende, Isabel, Atwood, Margaret, Auchincloss, Louis, business, Čapek, Karel, culture, Easmon, R. Sarif Gardner, Erle Stanley, gender, genre Gordimer, Nadine, Greene, Graham, journalism, justice, Kafka, Franz, Lampedusa, Giuseppe di, law, lawyer, legal procedure, murder, philosophy, professionalism, Simpson, O. J., television, trials, video, woman, Mortimer, John, O’Connor, Frank, profession, Ryunosuke, Akutagawa, Singer, Isaac Bashevis, theory, value judgment, Wishingrad, Jay
DOI :
Law is a specialized intellectual systern and a speciai social
system. But lying beyond such systems is the human substance
of suffering, desire, and compassion. Literature may move us
with its insights into the personal life hidden behind the abstract
theory and the impersonal procedures of law. This comparative
study of four short stories explores how the literary ari draws
forth our poignant encounter with the humanity underlying law.
This raises questions for the philosophy of law as weil focuses
attention upon aesthetic powers. The works studied are by Louis
Auchincloss (United States), Margaret Atwood (Canada, writing
in English), Franz Kafka (Czechoslovakia, writing in German),
and Graham Greene (England).