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Deadlines are tricky. They determine the duration of our employment, the urgency of our tasks, and sometimes rob us of sleep. In short, they rule our lives. But as a "necessary evil," they escape critical scrutiny: despite the ubiquity of deadlines, academic debates about them are comparatively rare. This book fills this gap and, as a "deadline book," is dedicated to the theory and effect as well as the materiality and cultivation of deadlines. The approach is methodologically diverse. Based on opera material, the functions and dynamics of the legal structuring of time are analysed. These threads are further developed in the following chapters: They establish interdisciplinary connections and deal with the creation of intertemporal equality through legal time management, the necessity of democratic deadlines, the use of deadlines for crisis management, the effects of time pressure in the context of bureaucracy reduction, and finally the material reality of deadlines on their bumpy road to a fully digitised future. The power of deadlines proves to be dazzling throughout.