Legal insanity, moral insanity, and Stendhal's Le rouge et le noir.

PROBLEMS pertaining to concepts of legal and medical insanity have long been present and at times seem to defy solution. Differing views of justice, the impulse toward revenge, and the devices to expiate guilt of the individual and society complicate further the complex currents of any era. They were with us in the aftermath of the killing of a President and the condemnation of his alleged assassin's murderer. In 1843 Daniel M'Naghten was tried at Old Bailey for the slaying of Edward Drummond, secretary to the British Prime Minister, Sir Robert Peel, and it is from this event that the famed M'Naghten Rules emerged. They remain most influential in courts of law to this day. M'Naghten was declared not guilty on the ground of insanity. There was much opposition to this verdict.' Five years before the M'Naghten trial, in 1838, American psychiatrist Isaac Ray (1807-1881) published A Treatise on the Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity.2 It was used in the defence of M'Naghten and is regarded now as a classic. The issues accentuated in the trial and the publication were not isolated, however, and in word and action, as is usually the case, they undoubtedly reflected some developing forces that were 'in the air' at the time. Rumblings of social forces and pressures are generally represented in the literature of the day. Some of the themes that concern us here are capital punishment and the nature of 'insanity', but especially the legal plea of insanity and temporary insanity. In 1830, eight years prior to the appearance of Isaac Ray's treatise and thirteen years before the trial of Daniel M'Naghten, Stendhal (Henri Beyle) published Le Rouge et le Noir.3 Although he is said to have been little appreciated in his own day, he commands ample attention now and this novel is regarded as a classic. It is the story of Julien Sorel, a poor provincial boy who aspires to high status amidst the social and political turmoil of nineteenth century France. Whether the book is the first realistic novel or the first psychological novel as has been proclaimed by admirers is for the reader and students of literature to judge. Of immediate interest are sections at the end of the book where Julien Sorel, after shooting in an attempt to kill his former mistress, is awaiting trial and later facing death on the guillotine. The question of insanity arises not in the mind of young Sorel, who is offended by its mention, but in the mind of his attorney who appears to regard its presence quite seriously and not just as an expedient to save his client from death. On the other hand, Sorel's former mistress, Madame de Renal, comes to his aid and, aside from voicing opposition to capital punishment, evokes the theme of temporary insanity. This was clearly an effort to turn the tide although based on behaviour that was