Rape Narratives, Women’s Testimony, and Irish Law in 'Asking for It' and 'Dark Chapter'

Abstract

This chapter examines contemporary legal and literary narratives about rape cases in Ireland, focussing on Louise O’Neill’s 'Asking for It' and Winnie Li’s 'Dark Chapter'. By contrasting the two novels, and contextualising both in relation to a national history of ‘structural misogyny’ it highlights the limits and the potential for justice within both law and literature. Despite legal reform and testimony-centred judicial process, the article reveals the continuing power of traditional myths to underwrite legal story-telling and convert rape and other crimes into genres whose conventions exclude the adducing of women’s actual experience.