Kafka's indictment of modern law / Douglas E. Litowitz.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Litowitz, Douglas E., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Kafka, Franz, 1883-1924--Knowledge--Law.

Kafka, Franz.

Law in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (208 pages) : illustrations

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Lawrence : University Press of Kansas, [2017]

Summary:

"The legal system is often denounced as "Kafkaesque"--but what does this really mean? This is the question Douglas E. Litowitz tackles in his critical reading of Franz Kafka's writings about the law. Going far beyond Kafka's most familiar works--such as The Trial--Litowitz assembles a broad array of works that he refers to as "Kafka's legal fiction"--consisting of published and unpublished works that deal squarely with the law, as well as those that touch upon it indirectly, as in political, administrative, and quasi-judicial procedures. Cataloguing, explaining, and critiquing this body of work, Litowitz brings to bear all those aspects of Kafka's life that were connected to law--his legal education, his career as a lawyer, his drawings, and his personal interactions with the legal system. A close study of Kafka's legal writings reveals that Kafka held a consistent position about modern legal systems, characterized by a crippling nihilism. Modern legal systems, in Kafka's view, consistently fail to make good on their stated pretensions--in fact often accomplish the opposite of what they promise. This indictment, as Litowitz demonstrates, is not confined to the legal system of Kafka's day, but applies just as surely to our own. A short, clear, comprehensive introduction to Kafka's legal writings and thought, Kafka's Indictment of Modern Law is not uncritical. Even as he clarifies Kafka's experience of and ideas about the law, Litowitz offers an informed perspective on the limitations of these views. His book affords rare insight into a key aspect of Kafka's work, and into the connection between the writing, the writer, and the legal world."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note:

Introduction: An Outline of the Project

Part I: Exegesis

1. Kafka's Life in the Law

2. Isolating the Relevant Texts

3. Narrative Summaries

4. Kafka's Target

Modern Law

Part II: Interpretation

5. Modern Law Has Come Unmoored from Its Normative Grounding

6. Modern Law is Inherently Dystopian

7. Modern Law Inverts Punishment So That It Pre-dates the Crime

8. Modern Law Fails to Accept the Ambiguity of Texts

9. Modern law Is Comic and Carnivalesque

Conclusion: Was Kafka Correct about Modern Law?

Notes

Index.

Notes:

Includes index.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780700624744

0700624740

OCLC:

1003507133