Table Of ContentPOETIC JUSTICE AND
LEGAL FICTIONS
Literature reveals the intense efforts of moral imagination required
to articulate what justice is and how it might be satisfied. Examin-
ingawidevarietyoftexts,includingShakespeare’splays,Gilbertand
Sullivan’soperas,andmodernistpoetics,PoeticJusticeandLegalFic-
tions explores how literary laws and values illuminate and challenge
the jurisdiction of justice and the law. Jonathan Kertzer examines
howjusticeisarticulatedbyitscommandof,orsubmissionto,time,
nature, singularity, truth, transcendence, and sacrifice, marking the
distancebetweenthepromiseofjusticetosatisfyourmoralandsocia-
bleneedsanditsfailuretodoso.PoeticJusticeandLegalFictionswill
be invaluable reading for scholars of the law within literature and
amongmodernistandtwentieth-centuryliteraturespecialists.
jonathan kertzer is Professor of English at the University of
Calgary. His previous publications include Poetic Argument: Stud-
ies in Modern Poetry (1989), “That House in Manawaka”: Margaret
Laurence’s “A Bird in the House” (1992), and Worrying the Nation:
ImaginingaNationalLiteratureinEnglishCanada(1998).
POETIC JUSTICE AND
LEGAL FICTIONS
JONATHAN KERTZER
cambridge university press
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Kertzer,Jonathan,1946–
Poeticjusticeandlegalfictions:studiesinliteraryjustice/JonathanKertzer.
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Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
isbn978-0-521-19645-1(hardback)
1.Justiceinliterature. 2.Lawandliterature. 3.Legalstories–Historyandcriticism.
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Dedicated
inlovingmemoryofmyparents
SamuelandMiriamKertzer
∗∗∗
AndasalwaysforAdrienne
thirtyyears
Contents
Acknowledgements pageviii
1 Lemotjuste 1
2 Lifeplusninety-nineyears:thefantasyoflegalfictions 24
3 Time’sdesire:thetemporalityofjustice 49
4 Onetouchofnature:literatureandnaturallaw 71
5 Thecourseofaparticular:justiceandsingularity 91
6 Truth,justice,andthepathosofunderstanding 118
7 Conclusion:legalfictions 138
Notes 146
Bibliography 157
Index 167
vii
Acknowledgements
EarlierversionsofchaptersappearedinMosaic,EnglishStudiesinCanada,
Twentieth-CenturyLiterature,andLaw,Culture,andtheHumanities.
My thanks to Lee Zimmerman of Twentieth-Century Literature for his
encouragementandsupport.
MythankstoNancyChillagandRodrigoDuranforpermissiontouse
thecoverphotographofMr.Duran’swonderfulstatueLadyofJustice.
My thanks to Cambridge University Press, especially to Sarah Roberts
andtoFionaLittleforherscrupulousworkinediting.
viii
chapter 1
Le mot juste
injusticeiseveryvirtuecomprehended
(Aristotle,NicomacheanEthics108)
justice:Neverworryaboutit
law(the):Nobodyknowswhatitis
written:“Wellwritten”:ahall-porter’sencomium,appliedtothenewspaper
serialhefindsentertaining
(GustaveFlaubert,TheDictionaryofAcceptedIdeas55,58,91)
Flaubert’smockeryofbourgeoisindifferencetojusticeandlegalitycontrasts
hisowndevotiontojusticeasthesupremeliteraryvalue,thevirtueinwhich
all others are comprehended. The just word – le mot juste – is a phrase
expressinghisidealoflinguisticprecisionassociatedwithpainstakingcraft
seeking exactly the right word to express exactly the right idea to convey
exactlytherightimpressiontohisreaders.Writingwell,heclaimed,ismore
than a matter of verbal felicity, although felicity is its reward. “[T]o write
well is everything,” a writer’s first duty, he told George Sand (Flaubert,
Letters 2.231), but it is not an end in itself. Although he once proposed
writing a book “about nothing, a book dependent on nothing external,
whichwouldbeheldtogetherbytheinternalstrengthofitsstyle”(1.154),
his letters reveal that he was not satisfied with style for its own sake. It
should be an avenue to illumination and “exaltation” (2.80). The wrong
word is an affront not just to harmony, but to clear-sightedness and clear
thinking.
ForthemomentathingisTrue,itisgood...WhenIcomeuponabadassonance
orarepetitioninoneofmysentences,I’msureI’mflounderingintheFalse.By
dint of searching, I find the proper expression, which was always the only one,
andwhichis,atthesametime,harmonious.Thewordisneverlackingwhenone
possessestheidea.(2.231)
The right word appears when the idea is true, but only the right word
will express its truth. Le mot is juste when it contributes to a justice of
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