Masoch, Ehrlich and Petrażycki: literature and law as a framework for analysis of sado-masochistic relations in the XIXth century
Masoch, Ehrlich and Petrażycki: literature and law as a framework for analysis of sado-masochistic relations in the XIXth century

Summary/Abstract: Likhovsky (2009) proposed recently a reading of the story of a sado-masochistic contract described by Sacher-Masoch in his “Venus in Furs”, which proved a good example of the “living law” as it was presented by Eugen Ehrlich. Both of them lived in the Eastern provinces of the Austro-Hungarian Empire where several local types of legal conduct used to be active. The writings of L. Petrażycki - who proclaimed a pluralist legal theory - seem however to give a better grasp of the idea of such contract. In accordance with Petrażycki’s sanctionless concept of law, the said contract is a good illustration of this type of unofficial and intuitive law, as it would be classified in Petrażycki’s theory. In contrast to Likhovsky the author claims that Masoch managed to create a wholly different contract from that described by Hobbes.

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