Towards a Legal Narratology II: Implications and Pathologies

This chapter builds on the suggestions made for a legal narratology in Chapter 9. It deals with the implications and pathologies of narratological insights for judicial practice in criminal law by drawing attention, firstly, to the false dichotomies of common law versus civil law and of inquisitorial versus accusatorial approaches, and secondly, by asking what it is in narratives (and images) in court surroundings that justifies their credibility. The effect of modern media and visuality on juries and judges, it suggests, is not to be underestimated. Its main argument being that to judge is to choose, this chapter offers suggestions for narratological research to differentiate between the pre-trial and the trial stage and to consider carefully how the defendant’s narrative is written down. The ability to “narrate oneself”, it is argued finally, is a matter of voice and this is illustrated by means of John Coetzee’s Disgrace.