Western Law, Russian Justice: Dostoevsky, the Jury Trial, and the Law

Gary Rosenshield

Jul 2005 · Univ of Wisconsin Press

About this ebook

Gary Rosenshield offers a new interpretation of Dostoevsky's greatest novel, The Brothers Karamazov. He explores Dostoevsky's critique and exploitation of the jury trial for his own ideological agenda, both in his journalism and his fiction, contextualizing his portrayal of trials and trial participants (lawyers, jurors, defendants, judges) in the political, social, and ideological milieu of his time. Further, the author presents Dostoevsky's critique in terms of the main notions of the critical legal studies movement in the United States, showing how, over one hundred and twenty years ago, Dostoevsky explicitly dealt with the same problems that the law-and-literature movement has been confronting over the past two decades. This book should appeal to anyone with an interest in Russian literature, Russian history and culture, legal studies, law and literature, narratology, or metafiction and literary theory.

About the author

Gary Rosenshield is professor of Slavic languages and literature at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the author of Crime and Punishment: The Techniques of the Omniscient Author, Pushkin and the Genres of Madness, published by the University of Wisconsin Press, and numerous scholarly articles.