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''Jarndyce and Jarndyce'' is a fictional court case from the novel ''Bleak House'' by Charles Dickens, progressing in the English Court of Chancery. The case is referred to throughout ''Bleak House'' and is a central plot device / thematic element of the novel. "Jarndyce and Jarndyce" has become a byword and metaphor for seemingly interminable legal proceedings. For example, Lord Denning, when referring to ''Midland Bank v Green'' () 1 All ER 583,〔(UK Law LLB )〕 said, "The ''Green'' saga rivals in time and money the story of ''Jarndyce v Jarndyce''." Dickens consistently refers to the case as "Jarndyce and Jarndyce", the way it would be referred to in speech (the "v" separating the parties is an abbreviation of the Latin ''versus'', but, when spoken in Commonwealth countries, it is normally rendered as "and" or "against"). ==Plot== ''Jarndyce v Jarndyce'' concerns the fate of a large inheritance. The case has dragged on for many generations before the action of the novel, so that, when it is resolved late in the narrative, legal costs have devoured the whole estate. Dickens used it to attack the chancery court system as being near totally worthless, as any "honourable man among its () practitioners" says, "Suffer any wrong that can be done you rather than come here!" All of the main characters are connected in some way through the case, though the legal proceedings appear only as background plot. Aside from the lawyers who sue and defend the case, every character who directly associates with it suffers some tragic fate. Miss Flite has long since lost her mind when the narrative begins. Richard Carstone dies trying to win the inheritance for himself after spending much of his life so distracted by the notion of it that he cannot commit to any other pursuit. John Jarndyce, by contrast, finds the whole process tiresome and tries to have as little to do with it as he possibly can, one of many examples of the character's wise and self-effacing demeanour. Dickens introduces the case in the first chapter in terms which make the futility of the matter clear: Jarndyce and Jarndyce drones on. This scarecrow of a suit has, in course of time, become so complicated, that no man alive knows what it means. The parties to it understand it least; but it has been observed that no two Chancery lawyers can talk about it for five minutes, without coming to a total disagreement as to all the premises. Innumerable children have been born into the cause; innumerable young people have married into it; innumerable old people have died out of it. Scores of persons have deliriously found themselves made parties in Jarndyce and Jarndyce, without knowing how or why; whole families have inherited legendary hatreds with the suit. The little plaintiff or defendant, who was promised a new rocking-horse when Jarndyce and Jarndyce should be settled, has grown up, possessed himself of a real horse, and trotted away into the other world. Fair wards of court have faded into mothers and grandmothers; a long procession of Chancellors has come in and gone out; the legion of bills in the suit have been transformed into mere bills of mortality; there are not three Jarndyces left upon the earth perhaps, since old Tom Jarndyce in despair blew his brains out at a coffee-house in Chancery Lane; but Jarndyce and Jarndyce still drags its dreary length before the Court, perennially hopeless. The ending of the case reduces the whole court to fits of laughter. From Chapter 65: We asked a gentleman by us, if he knew what cause was on? He told us Jarndyce and Jarndyce. We asked him if he knew what was doing in it? He said, really no he did not, nobody ever did; but as well as he could make out, it was over. Over for the day? we asked him. No, he said; over for good. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Jarndyce and Jarndyce」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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