Residues of justice : literature, law, philosophy

291 Pages·1996·6.43 MB·English

by  Wai-chee Dimock

RESIDUES OF JUSTICE
BLANKPAGE
RESIDUES
OF JUSTICE
LITERATURE, LAW,
PHILOSOPHY
WAI CHEE DIMOCK
University of California Press
Berkeley · Los Angeles · London
The use of previously published portions of this book is
gratefully acknowledged:
"Class, Gender, and a History of Metonomy," from Rethink
ing Class: Literary Studies and Social Formations, edited by
Wai Chee Dimock and Michael T. Gilmore. Copyright ©
1994 by Columbia University Press. Reprinted with per
mission of the publisher.
"Criminal Law, Female Virtue, and the Rise of Liberalism,"
reprinted by permission from Yale Journal of Law and the
Humanities 4 (Summer 1992).
"The Economy of Pain," reprinted by permission from
Raritan: A Quarterly Review, Vol. IX, No. 4 (Spring 1990).
Copyright © 1990 by Raritan, 31 Mine St., New Brunswick,
N.J., 08903.
"Rightful Subjectivity," reprinted by permission from Yale
Journal of Criticism 4 (Fall 1990).
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press. Ltd.
London, England
First paperback printing 1997
© 1996 by
The Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dimock, Wai Chee, 1953-
Residues of justice: literature, law, philosophy / Wai
Chee Dimock.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-520-20244-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Justice in literature. 2. Justice. 3. Justice
(Philosophy) 1. Title.
PN56.J87D56 1996
809' .93353-dc20 95-39867
CIP
Printed in the United States of America
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence
of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. 8
To the memory of my f ather
BLANKPAGE
The very mercy of the law cries out
Most audible, even from his proper tangue,
11 An Angelo for Claudio, death for death!"
Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers leisure;
Like doth quit like, and measure still for measure.
William Shakespeare, 1604
BLANKPAGE
Contents
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction: Justice and Commensurability 1
1. Crime and Punishment 11
Kant, Nietzsche, Beccaria 12
Taxonomy and Jurisdiction 19
Uneven Development 23
Gendered Justice: The Deerslayer 27
Crime as a Signifying Field 31
Equality Republican and Liberal 36
Decline of Political Rationality 43
Feminiza tion of Virtue
47
2. Part and Whole 57
Metonymy and Materialism 58
Bodies Physical and Nonphysical 62
Marxist Individualism 70
Marx and Durkheim 74
New Historicism and the Preposition ''In'' 77
Reading the Incomplete: Herman Melville 79
The Limits of Totality: Rebecca Harding Davis 89
3. Luck and Love 96
Justice by Lottery 96
Luck and Desert: John Rawls 102
Syntax and Democracy: Noam Chomsky 106
Grammatical Subjects: "Song of Myself" 113
Semantics and Memory 120
Preference Human and Divine: The Wide, Wide World 124
ix