Law "In" Literature

What insights about law emerge from literature?

To address this question, the resources in this category encompass classic works from the world’s great literary canon. These resources include law journal articles (e.g., published scholarship or practitioner articles), reviews (e.g., of books and dramatic performances), lecture notes (to assist in class presentations and study) and commentary (e.g., monologues and dialogs).

In particular, the resources herein explore one or more of the following questions:

1. Law’s Other? To what extent is, and should be, literature the “other” of law (“law’s other”), and thus provide an imaginative and/or moral (ethical) alternative to law?
2. Law-Literature Interplay? How does literature reflect, incorporate and/or react to the law, legal themes, legal institutions and/or legal analysis – and vice versa?
3. Portraying Law? How does literature depict the law (both substantive and procedural), legal institutions and lawyers?
4. Legal Storytelling? Can, and should, literature and literary criticism be used to explain and enhance narration in the law (legal narratives), i.e., can a literary narrative and the critical analysis thereof help – in a practical sense – lawyers develop, frame and present narratives about their cases and transactions?

To explore these matters, classic fiction, poetry, drama and essays are studied to reveal enduring legal themes common across all countries.

The themes in such works include justice and morality (and more specifically, the rule of law versus equity), obedience and rebellion (implicating custom, law and the political order), wealth and poverty (and more generally, law, society and power), fairness and prejudice (including implicit bias) and punishment and redemption (including retribution/revenge versus rehabilitation and forgiveness).

The table below lists some of the classic literary figures whose work entails suggests (directly or indirectly) legal themes “in” literature. By no means is this list exclusive. Indeed, there is no “right” list; debates about who is part of the “canon,” assuming there is one, is fascinating, ferocious and forever.

The table rests on this assumption: yes, there is a canon, which has a core, but also yes, this canon evolves. Most of the authors listed in the table are generally – but by no means universally – acknowledged to be within the Western canon. To know their works is to be well-schooled in the liberal arts, and such grounding enhances the professional excellence and personal well-being of a lawyer.