The Subject before the Law: On Robert Musil's broken fiction and narrative humanism within the law
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Karen-Margrethe Simonsen
Karen-Margrethe L. Simonsen is Doctor Phil., Associate Professor, Section for Comparative Literature, Department of Aesthetic Studies, University of Aarhus. Recent publications in English: “Holocaust Literature and the Shaping of European Identity after the Second World War: The Case of Jorge Semprún” inEuropean Identity and the Second World War , ed. M. Spiering and M. J. Wintle (London: Macmillan/Palgrave, 2011), 256–278;Law and Literature. Interdisciplinary Readings and Perspectives , ed. with Ditlev Tamm (Copenhagen: DJØF Publishing House, 2010);World Literature and World Culture , ed. with J. Stougaard (Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2008); “Emergent Modernism” inComparing European Modernisms (Gaudeamus Pr.: Helsinki, 2008);Reinventions of the Novel , ed. with M. R. Thomsen and M. P. Huang (New York and Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2004); “Evilness and Law in Heinrich von Kleist's story ‘Michael Kohlhaas’” inUnderstanding Evil. An Interdisciplinary Approach , ed. Margaret Sönser Breen (Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2003).
Abstract
In this article, I will discuss the concept of narration, its role within a legal context, and the relation between narration and anti-narration in Robert Musil's modernist experiment, The Man without Qualities. I will argue that, through the portrayal of Moosbrugger, Musil's aim is to show that the rationality of the legal system is based on false narrations, which prevent us from understanding living reality. I will further discuss the interest of the Moosbrugger case within the novel, and discuss whether Moosbrugger is to be seen as a Dionysian hero or a possibilitist. In the final section, I will argue that Moosbrugger can be seen as a homo sacer, as defined by Giorgio Agamben, and that it is due to this position that he is able to question our presuppositions about the criminal.
About the author
Karen-Margrethe L. Simonsen is Doctor Phil., Associate Professor, Section for Comparative Literature, Department of Aesthetic Studies, University of Aarhus. Recent publications in English: “Holocaust Literature and the Shaping of European Identity after the Second World War: The Case of Jorge Semprún” in European Identity and the Second World War, ed. M. Spiering and M. J. Wintle (London: Macmillan/Palgrave, 2011), 256–278; Law and Literature. Interdisciplinary Readings and Perspectives, ed. with Ditlev Tamm (Copenhagen: DJØF Publishing House, 2010); World Literature and World Culture, ed. with J. Stougaard (Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2008); “Emergent Modernism” in Comparing European Modernisms (Gaudeamus Pr.: Helsinki, 2008); Reinventions of the Novel, ed. with M. R. Thomsen and M. P. Huang (New York and Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2004); “Evilness and Law in Heinrich von Kleist's story ‘Michael Kohlhaas’” in Understanding Evil. An Interdisciplinary Approach, ed. Margaret Sönser Breen (Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2003).
©[2013] by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Focus: Robert Musil
- Understanding Fact and Fiction in Robert Musil's The Man without Qualities
- The Subject before the Law: On Robert Musil's broken fiction and narrative humanism within the law
- Moosbrugger: The genealogy of a demi-fou
- Shakespeare against Genre
- The Strange Clauses of Dr Jekyll's Will: The body as its precondition and its legacy
- A White Tiger in the Indian Law Jungle: A reading of Aravind Adiga's debut novel
- Book Reviews
Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Focus: Robert Musil
- Understanding Fact and Fiction in Robert Musil's The Man without Qualities
- The Subject before the Law: On Robert Musil's broken fiction and narrative humanism within the law
- Moosbrugger: The genealogy of a demi-fou
- Shakespeare against Genre
- The Strange Clauses of Dr Jekyll's Will: The body as its precondition and its legacy
- A White Tiger in the Indian Law Jungle: A reading of Aravind Adiga's debut novel
- Book Reviews
