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Dramatic Justice : Trial by Theater in the Age of the French Revolution / Yann Robert.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, [2018]Copyright date: ©2019Description: 1 online resource (344 p.) : 1 illusContent type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9780812295658
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 792.094409033 23
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources:
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction -- PART I. Theater as Justice -- Chapter 1. Fixing the Law: Reenactment in Diderot’s Fils naturel -- Chapter 2. The Many Faces of Aristophanes: The Rise of a Judicial Theater -- PART II. Justice as Theater -- Chapter 3. Players at the Bar: The Birth of the Modern Lawyer -- Chapter 4. Judges, Spectators, and Theatrocracy -- Chapter 5. From Parterre to Pater: Dreaming of Domestic Tribunals -- PART III. The Revolution’s Performance of Justice -- Chapter 6. Performing Justice in the Early Years of the Revolution -- Chapter 7. The Curtain Falls on Judicial Theater and Theatrical Justice -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments
Summary: For most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, classical dogma and royal censorship worked together to prevent French plays from commenting on, or even worse, reenacting current political and judicial affairs. Criminal trials, meanwhile, were designed to be as untheatrical as possible, excluding from the courtroom live debates, trained orators, and spectators. According to Yann Robert, circumstances changed between 1750 and 1800 as parallel evolutions in theater and justice brought them closer together, causing lasting transformations in both.Robert contends that the gradual merging of theatrical and legal modes in eighteenth-century France has been largely overlooked because it challenges two widely accepted narratives: first, that French theater drifted toward entertainment and illusionism during this period and, second, that the French justice system abandoned any performative foundation it previously had in favor of a textual one. In Dramatic Justice, he demonstrates that the inverse of each was true. Robert traces the rise of a "judicial theater" in which plays denounced criminals by name, even forcing them, in some cases, to perform their transgressions anew before a jeering public. Likewise, he shows how legal reformers intentionally modeled trial proceedings on dramatic representations and went so far as to recommend that judges mimic the sentimental judgment of spectators and that lawyers seek private lessons from actors. This conflation of theatrical and legal performances provoked debates and anxieties in the eighteenth century that, according to Robert, continue to resonate with present concerns over lawsuit culture and judicial entertainment.Dramatic Justice offers an alternate history of French theater and judicial practice, one that advances new explanations for several pivotal moments in the French Revolution, including the trial of Louis XVI and the Terror, by showing the extent to which they were shaped by the period's conflicted relationship to theatrical justice.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9780812295658

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction -- PART I. Theater as Justice -- Chapter 1. Fixing the Law: Reenactment in Diderot’s Fils naturel -- Chapter 2. The Many Faces of Aristophanes: The Rise of a Judicial Theater -- PART II. Justice as Theater -- Chapter 3. Players at the Bar: The Birth of the Modern Lawyer -- Chapter 4. Judges, Spectators, and Theatrocracy -- Chapter 5. From Parterre to Pater: Dreaming of Domestic Tribunals -- PART III. The Revolution’s Performance of Justice -- Chapter 6. Performing Justice in the Early Years of the Revolution -- Chapter 7. The Curtain Falls on Judicial Theater and Theatrical Justice -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- Acknowledgments

restricted access online access with authorization star

http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

For most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, classical dogma and royal censorship worked together to prevent French plays from commenting on, or even worse, reenacting current political and judicial affairs. Criminal trials, meanwhile, were designed to be as untheatrical as possible, excluding from the courtroom live debates, trained orators, and spectators. According to Yann Robert, circumstances changed between 1750 and 1800 as parallel evolutions in theater and justice brought them closer together, causing lasting transformations in both.Robert contends that the gradual merging of theatrical and legal modes in eighteenth-century France has been largely overlooked because it challenges two widely accepted narratives: first, that French theater drifted toward entertainment and illusionism during this period and, second, that the French justice system abandoned any performative foundation it previously had in favor of a textual one. In Dramatic Justice, he demonstrates that the inverse of each was true. Robert traces the rise of a "judicial theater" in which plays denounced criminals by name, even forcing them, in some cases, to perform their transgressions anew before a jeering public. Likewise, he shows how legal reformers intentionally modeled trial proceedings on dramatic representations and went so far as to recommend that judges mimic the sentimental judgment of spectators and that lawyers seek private lessons from actors. This conflation of theatrical and legal performances provoked debates and anxieties in the eighteenth century that, according to Robert, continue to resonate with present concerns over lawsuit culture and judicial entertainment.Dramatic Justice offers an alternate history of French theater and judicial practice, one that advances new explanations for several pivotal moments in the French Revolution, including the trial of Louis XVI and the Terror, by showing the extent to which they were shaped by the period's conflicted relationship to theatrical justice.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 25. Jun 2024)