{"title":"Mark Twain’s Legal Burlesques and the Democratization of American Legalese","authors":"J. Baggett","doi":"10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0095","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Abstract:Mark Twain’s engagement with the “infernal phraseology of the law” spanned his career: from his sketches in Virginia City to the courtroom trials of his novels. Working in the context of legal reform movements, and using his own knowledge and mastery of law and procedure, Twain’s legal burlesques develop into fully dramatized narratives of humor and satire in which legal rhetoric and the vernacular act as “infernal or subversive agents” of the authority inherent in the law. Thus, at a time when Samuel Clemens began to fashion the voice of Mark Twain, he worked within the context of reform movements that would democratize and demythologize legal language.","PeriodicalId":41060,"journal":{"name":"Mark Twain Annual","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2021-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Mark Twain Annual","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.5325/marktwaij.19.1.0095","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LITERATURE, AMERICAN","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
Abstract:Mark Twain’s engagement with the “infernal phraseology of the law” spanned his career: from his sketches in Virginia City to the courtroom trials of his novels. Working in the context of legal reform movements, and using his own knowledge and mastery of law and procedure, Twain’s legal burlesques develop into fully dramatized narratives of humor and satire in which legal rhetoric and the vernacular act as “infernal or subversive agents” of the authority inherent in the law. Thus, at a time when Samuel Clemens began to fashion the voice of Mark Twain, he worked within the context of reform movements that would democratize and demythologize legal language.
期刊介绍：
The Mark Twain Annual publishes articles related to Mark Twain and those who surrounded him and serves as an outlet for new scholarship as well as new pedagogical approaches. It is the official publication of the Mark Twain Circle of America, an international association of people interested in the life and work of Mark Twain. The Circle encourages interest in Mark Twain and fosters the formal presentation of ideas about the author and his work, as well as the informal exchange of information among its members.
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