| A Power to Do Justice: Jurisdiction, English Literature, and the Rise of Common Law Contributor(s): Cormack, Bradin (Author) |
|
 |
ISBN: 0226116247 ISBN-13: 9780226116242 Publisher: University of Chicago Press OUR PRICE: $98.01 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: February 2008 Annotation: English law underwent rapid transformation in the sixteenth century, in response to the Reformation and also to heightened litigation and legal professionalization. As the common law became more comprehensive and systematic, the principle of jurisdiction came under particular strain. When the common law engaged with other court systems in England, when it encountered territories like Ireland and France, or when it confronted the ocean as a juridical space, the law revealed its qualities of ingenuity and improvisation. In other words, as Bradin Cormack argues, jurisdictional crisis made visible the law's resemblance to the literary arts." A Power to Do Justice "shows how Renaissance writers engaged the practical and conceptual dynamics of jurisdiction, both as a subject for critical investigation and as a frame for articulating literature's sense of itself. Reassessing the relation between English literature and law from More to Shakespeare, Cormack argues that where literary texts attend to jurisdiction, they dramatize how boundaries and limits are the very precondition of law's power, even as they clarify the forms of intensification that make literary space a reality. Tracking cultural responses to Renaissance jurisdictional thinking and legal centralization, "A Power to Do Justice" makes theoretical, literary-historical, and methodological contributions that set a new standard for law and the humanities and for the cultural history of early modern law and literature. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Literary Criticism | English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh - History | Europe - Great Britain - General |
| Dewey: 820.900 |
| LCCN: 2007024210 |
| Physical Information: 1.2" H x 6.39" W x 9.25" (1.55 lbs) 424 pages |
| Themes: - Cultural Region - British Isles |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: English law underwent rapid transformation in the sixteenth century, in response to the Reformation and also to heightened litigation and legal professionalization. As the common law became more comprehensive and systematic, the principle of jurisdiction came under particular strain. When the common law engaged with other court systems in England, when it encountered territories like Ireland and France, or when it confronted the ocean as a juridical space, the law revealed its qualities of ingenuity and improvisation. In other words, as Bradin Cormack argues, jurisdictional crisis made visible the law's resemblance to the literary arts. A Power to Do Justice shows how Renaissance writers engaged the practical and conceptual dynamics of jurisdiction, both as a subject for critical investigation and as a frame for articulating literature's sense of itself. Reassessing the relation between English literature and law from More to Shakespeare, Cormack argues that where literary texts attend to jurisdiction, they dramatize how boundaries and limits are the very precondition of law's power, even as they clarify the forms of intensification that make literary space a reality. Tracking cultural responses to Renaissance jurisdictional thinking and legal centralization, A Power to Do Justice makes theoretical, literary-historical, and methodological contributions that set a new standard for law and the humanities and for the cultural history of early modern law and literature. |
Contributor Bio(s): Cormack, Bradin: - Bradin Cormack is professor of English at Princeton University. |