Ifigenia e Kaspar Hauser. La giustizia dello sguardo innocente

Within a wide and continuing dialogue of law (and justice) with literature, the essay focuses on the main character of Goethe’s drama, Iphigenia in Tauris. The relationship (interaction) between her and king Toas is deemed particularly meaningful for the legal perspective, as her renunciation of violence and deception as means to free herself from captivity seems to effect a matching renunciation of the punishing violence of his barbarian state, just thanks to the exposed innocence of the young priestess of Diana A kind of innocence apt to move and humanize the harsh rigours of criminal law is seen also in the historical character of Kaspar Hauser, whose mysterious case has long intrigued German culture and directly affected one of the most prominent criminal lawyers of nineteenth century, Paul Johann Anselm von Feuerbach