
Contents
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1. The universality of fiction 1. The universality of fiction
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1.1. The theory of constancy 1.1. The theory of constancy
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1.2. The schematic theory 1.2. The schematic theory
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2. Fiction’s access to reality 2. Fiction’s access to reality
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2.1. The law’s public judicial application 2.1. The law’s public judicial application
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2.2. The law’s restriction of literary referentiality 2.2. The law’s restriction of literary referentiality
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3. Conclusion 3. Conclusion
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11 The Grin’s Cat: Language, Law, and Literature
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Published:February 2013
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Abstract
This chapter asks: in literature, can the subject be not only a literary fiction, a character, but also a legal fiction, say a person, and beyond that, a real thing, that is, an individual thing? It first argues that law and literature are similar in their relation to the real world. It then paradoxically questions one obvious difference between the two, especially as creating imbalance between them in relation to referential access to the real world. Law and literature are similar, not identical, in being required by principle or theory to be universal, not to deal with the individual, and so to be referentially vacuous in respect of the real world. However, law and literature differ in that the law is intended to be applicable to actual persons and in the process to real individuals, but withholds literature, despite the latter's sources, simulations, and effects, within a referential vacuum from the real world. The chapter concludes by noting that the law has tended to restore the balance between law and literature, but submits paradoxically and then rejects the proposition, firstly, that full force should be acknowledged to paratextual disclaimers that a literary text is fiction and to theories that deny truth to literary predications; and, secondly, that all predications of real individuals should be subjected to similar invalidation.
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