Geoffrey Robertson - Conflicting perspectives Essay

We are positioned to agree with his perspective through his use of selective anecdotes and witty language such as puns that are incorporated to mock the conflicting perspective. The fiction novel, “Rosy Is My Relative” by Gerald Darrell, also explores the easily manipulate nature of the legal system, positioning a conservative English prosecutor against a witty defense counsel. It does so in a satirical manner, and uses humorous character stereotypes to persuade the responder to support the protagonist’s case. In both, “The Trials of Oz” and “Romans in Britain”, Robertson resents the responder with the overzealous nature of conservatives in politics and law In their prosecution of pornography, the censorship he feels threatens the human rights of the defendants.

He does this by representing the judge Justice Argyle as prejudice and out of touch with the time. This is shown by his careful selection of anecdotal evidence including the Judge’s motto, “We Just don’t do this kind of thing in Birmingham”.

Through this we understand Robertson’s attempt to show the narrow-mindedness of the Judge in this way. He mocks him through his description of the Judges verdict on the Oz Case with the metaphor “with the relief of man making a bowel movement after weeks of constipation”, which effectively conveys both the Judges perspective on the Oz editors as well as Robertson’s perspective on the Judge which can be seen as an Incompetent and self-important fool. As the judgment is handed down, Robertson’s rhetorical question “where were we, the Soviet Union? Brings an image of the English legal system as an oppressive censorious power, opposed to once that Is Just.

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It powerfully asserts his view of the case for the responder to understand that the censorship of Oz magazine was similar to the oppressive Soviet regime and therefore must be opposed. Through this, we recognize that the conflicting perspectives presented by the composer are fundamental in enabling our human desire to raise questions about significant issues. Robertson in the “-Trials of Oz”, and Darrell through “Rosy is My Relative”, both portray the law as a game, a fluid process whose outcome can be significantly influenced by the perspectives that contend for justification within it. Thus, it can be seen as unjust at times. Duress’s fictive narrative and Robertson’s non-fiction novel compellingly give an account of the conflicting perspectives In their texts through satirical representations of their characters.

The simile used to describe the Judge, “looking like a surprised mole” shows the legal system as blind and therefore easily Magnums, by calling the Judge Lord Turkey, as “tops’, mocking his reputed befuddled nature. Darrell sets up the law as a confused entity to reinforce his argument that it can be subject to manipulation. The superiority of Sir Magnum’s perspective over the prosecution’s case is summed up with combined metaphor and truism, “Remember that a spider spends hours weaving a web which you can destroy with a flick of the wrist”. This metaphor implies that the laws perspective on an issue (the web) can be rover wrong simply by an act of dramatic oratory flourish, as he is prone to throughout the novel.

In Sir Magnums’ explanation of the law to his client Adrian, “working on the extraordinary system that twelve men are better than two or six or four, nobody takes into consideration that twelve imbeciles might be more dangerous than two”, Darrell aptly sums his interpretation of the law. Similar to Geoffrey Robertson’s interpretation, Darrell uses Magnum’s rhetoric and truisms to convey how the law is a game that is played, and is played to be won by the man who exploits the weaknesses of the system. The satirical tone in his writing is a key factor in humorously presenting this perspective and thus our human desire to raise questions can be evoked. The Romans in Britain” echoes the central issue of “The Trials of Oz”, except this time Robertson shows a private prosecution with the intent to censor and discredit the defendant.

Again, Robertson mocks the conservative British attitude towards pornographic expression through his extensive use of satire to simultaneously mock the ludicrous nature of the case and ridicule Mary Whitehorse; the morally pompous “cultural vandal”, which assists in persuading spenders to support his opinion on censorship of the theatre. Robertson’s disdain for “She who must be dismayed” is ubiquitous, categorizing Whitehorse as a fundamentalist religious crusader through a accumulation of biblical allusions “devout legal battalion”, “divined” and “Rapturously’. He cleverly combines prosecutor with the sexually connotative dominatrix to or the pun “prosecutors”, thus ridiculing and deflating Hothouse’s status and condescending her perspective that the 1981 production in the Royal National Theatre was obscene and liable to corrupt audiences with its demonstration of buggery.

The responder is provided with an undistorted view of the play as extracts of the play are included to convey its moral and cultural significance and essentially demonstrate the “emetic”, opposed to “erotic” nature of the scene, which Robertson appreciates as a “puritanical work”. Robertson, through his satirical portrayals of Justice Argyle and Mary Whitehorse as cantankerous old conservatives with outdated views of society, and the contrasting of them in his book with his own conflicting liberal perspective, attempts to convey that such dogmatic pursuit of the censorship presented is a waste of time.

Robertson invites responders to share his amusement of the dramatic and pretentious nature of the British legal system through the extended metaphor of comparing the courtroom with the Theatre, thus allowing responders to fulfill their fundamental desire to raise questions about issues and persuading them to support his opinion on censorship of the theatre by dismissing the case and appreciating the play for its cultural value. In conclusion, Robertson and Darrell effectively demonstrate their ability to convey perspective allows the composers to raise particular issues from different contexts, enabling our human nature to inevitably raise questions.