Jog és/vagy irodalom a jakobinus perben

This article analyzes the prosecution’s and the defense’s arguments in the trial of János Batsányi. As accused, Batsányi was the one person who’s social status (captivi status) was ‘literary man’ (Auctor et Poëta), thus the files of the trial can be examined as resources of the idea of literature at the turn of the 19th century. The prosecution’s arguments are based on the concept that a literary work is merely a personal document, so it must be interpreted literally. On the contrary, the argument of the defense is, that the literature has a unique logic, it requires special point of view and special knowledge (e. g. notion of genres, history of literature etc.) to understand a poem, thus one can’t conceptualize literary works as personal documents. The court of law decided in favor of the defense