May 21, 2006

A List of Literature About Law

Over at the Law & Humanities Institute website, I have compiled a list of literary works about the law. This is part of a larger project at the Law & Humanities Institute website to develop a good repository of resources for law and humanities courses. If you have any ideas for this project, I'd greatly welcome them.

1 comment:

Troy said...

I have four suggestions for the reading list. I'm teaching a grad English class in Law and Lit. this summer. I'm using Owen Wister's The Virginian -- there would be no modern Western without it and of course it deals with a revenge society, justice, vigilantism, etc. I'm also using "Wasps" by Aristophanes -- great comedy about Athens' demos and the jury and the fickle nature of a "pure" democracy. I haven't gotten to them yet, so I can't vouch for the classroom discussion, though I know the class is excited about the Virginian.

I would also add "The Betrothed" by Alessandro Manzoni -- the Italian counterpart to Cooper. This is a historical novel set in an Italy run by Dons and the church and deals with ecclesiastical law, marriage and betrothal, and many other aspects. It's long so I left it out of my syllabus, but was a good read. It was written in 1827 and seems very well known in Italy and not so much here.

I'd also add James Fenimore Cooper's "The Pioneers" -- the first of the Leatherstocking Tales -- land issues, property rights, Native American issues, etc.

Your syllabus was a great help to me in setting my reading list. Thanks for this resource.

Troy Hinrichs