Zeitgeistreiches

Scherz und Ernst in der Juristenzeitung: Glossen aus 75 Jahren

Book cover: Zeitgeistreiches

Extent: 242 pages

Publisher: Wiley-VCH

Subjects: Law, Recreation: Leisure, Sports, & Travel

Language: German

Paperback (Forthcoming)

(November 2026)

ISBN: 9783162012555

5.75 x 8.9 inches

Price: $44.00

From A for Anwartschaft to Z for Zombie: Legal glosses are a particularly lively forum for wit and satire. Since 1951, the nearly 500 glosses published in the Juristenzeitung have combined social commentary, light-hearted reflections, and stylistic experimentation. This volume presents a selection that still amuses and provokes thought today.


More than a century and a half ago, a famous legal scholar turned his sharp satirical wit on his own discipline. His comic tour de force forever changed the way we look at law. And yet, a doctoral dissertation recently published by Mohr Siebeck observed: “Lawyers are not generally known for their sense of humour.”
How have the themes, styles, and appetite for debate in humorous approaches to law changed over time? Two anniversaries provide an occasion to look back at the nearly 500 glosses published in the Juristenzeitung (JZ) since 1951.
Thoroughly revised and expanded for its second edition, this volume documents the results of an editorial project and includes extensive annotations placing the JZ glosses in their biographical and historical contexts. Both an engaging anthology and a rich source for legal history, it reveals the biases, shifting trends, and interconnections that shaped post-war legal discourse, while showing that many of these legal asides from the past 75 years remain, or have once again become, remarkably rewarding reading today.