https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=1346222
https://doi.org/10.60056/Lit.2025.34.364-393
Odysseus’ Eyebrows: The Sirens’ Song and Temptations in Law
Stoyan Stavru
The article examines the significance of the mythological plots related to Odysseus, Orpheus and the Sirens and their possible significance in the field of philosophy of law. The importance of music in establishing and maintaining order is explored, including ways of distinguishing noise from song. Through the comparison between the “tied” aesthete Odysseus (of Homer) and the “untied” ethicist Ahab (of Melville), an attempt is made to present the possible generative potential of literature in the world of lawyers and especially in its epicenter, which is undoubtedly the court hall.
Keywords: Odysseus; sirens; Orpheus; law; music; trial; parallax
About the author: Professor Stoyan Stavru is а Doctor of Law (2009) and а Doctor of Philosophy (2015), as well as а Doctor of Philosophical Sciences (2021). Since 2021, he has been the Head of the “Ethical Studies” Section at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology at the Bulgarian Academy Of Sciences. Не was the organizer, together with the Center for Culture and Debate “The Red House,” of the series of debates in the field of bioethies and biolaw entitled “Dare to Ask!” (2012-2014). Additionally, he was the co-host, alongside Irina Nedeva, of the popular science radio series “Law in the Age of Super-Technologies,” broadcast on the Bulgarian National Radio, Horizon program (2014-2016). Не is the founder of the professional legal platform “Challenging the Law!” (2010) and the co-founder of the expert legal system system “Lexebra” (2022). Since 2008, he has bcen a lecturer in Medical Law and, since 2010, in Biolaw at Plovdiv University and Sofia University. He is also the principal organizer of twelve consecutive national conferences on bioethics and biolaw (2013-2024). His main research interests lie in property law and civil law, medical law, bioethics and biolaw, ethics and technology, as well as the interaction between athics, property, and climate concepts. He is the author of dozens of scholarly studies and articles, as well as the following books: “Questions of Bulgarian Property Law” (2008, 2010), “The Human Body as an Object of Property Richts” (2008), “Biolaw: Visions in Pandora’s Box. Book One and Book Two” (2013), “Medical Error” (2015), “Things in Their Natural State: Property and Liability for Damage in the Context of Article 50 of the Bulgarian Obligations and Contracts Act” (2020), “The Moral Dimensions of Property (Towards the Justification of a “Proprietary” Ecology)”, (2021), “Beyond Waste: A Philosophical Study on the Ownership of Waste” (2024), “Vertigo in Legal Thinking: On the Generative Potential of the Interaction Between Literature and Law” (2024) and others.Professor Stavru actively works toward fostering public and scholarly sensitivity to issues of bioethics, biolaw, and the ethical-legal regulation of the human body. A specific focus of his academic work is the exploration of the relationship between law and literature.
