Saint Joan

“Joan was persecuted essentially as she would be persecuted today.”

Shaw compares the medieval past to his contemporary present, using repetition and a short, direct sentence to emphasize his point. The Preface therefore indicates that the play will satirize and critique contemporary culture as well as offer an interpretation of history.

“It is what men do at their best, with good intentions, and what normal men and women find they must and will do in spite of their intentions, that really concern us.”

Using epanalepsis, a rhetorical device where a clause repeats within a sentence, Shaw draws attention to the concept of intentions. He argues that the antagonists of the play persecuted Joan with good intentions, and also felt compelled to act regardless of those intentions because of outside factors. This contributes to Shaw’s argument that the antagonists of the play are not criminals.

“Miracles are all right, Polly. The only difficulty about them is that they don’t happen nowadays.”

Robert de Baudricourt debates with Bertrand de Poulengey, using casual language familiar to the 1920s, rather than the elevated or archaic sounding speech that one might expect from a medieval setting. This serves Shaw’s purpose of contrasting the past and the present, making the characters speak like modern people and espouse the same rationalist skepticism that Shaw expects from his 1920s audience.

“We are all subject to the King of Heaven; and He gave us our countries and our languages and meant us to keep to them. If it were not so it would be murder to kill an Englishman in battle; and you, Squire, would be in great danger of hell fire.”

Joan employs irony in her defense of nationalism, implying that God does not consider killing an Englishman to be murder if he is invading French soil. By referring to God as the “King of Heaven,” Joan implies a connection between the mortal King Charles VII and God’s role as a ruler. The language draws a contrast between Baudricourt and other knights of his class, who see war as a game, and Joan, who believes they ought to be fighting for a holier purpose.

“If I went into England against the will of God to conquer England, and tried to live there and speak its language, the devil would enter into me; and when I was old I should shudder to remember the wickedness I did.”

Joan frames her nationalistic sentiments using a Christian allusion. Rather than making a political or ethical argument for respecting the borders of other sovereign nations, Joan claims that the devil possesses anyone who invades another country. This rhetorical allusion to Christian doctrine indicates that Joan’s loyalty to France is a component of her holy mission, and therefore justifies the military violence that she enacts against England’s army.

“A miracle, my friend, is an event which creates faith. That is the purpose and nature of miracles. They may seem very wonderful to the people who witness them, and very simple to those who perform them. That does not matter; if they confirm or create faith they are true miracles.”

The Archbishop of Rheims defines miracles by their impact, deviating from the word’s usual definition as a divinely inspired supernatural act. The Archbishop’s pragmatism serves Shaw’s goal of satirizing the political motivations of the medieval Catholic Church, but it also advances the play’s argument about Joan’s miraculous life: Regardless of whether her miracles came from God or from her own talent, she galvanized the French against the invading English as no one else could.

“But if you prophesy that I shall be hanged, I shall never be able to resist temptation, because I shall always be telling myself that I may as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.”

Gilles de Rais, known as Bluebeard, flippantly defies the Archbishop of Rheims, using a figurative aphorism to allude to the crimes he was accused of historically. The aphorism emphasizes his wittiness, but it also affiliates him with a wolf, a predatory animal that preys on defenseless sheep, paralleling how the real Gilles de Rais was accused of murdering peasant children.

“Charlie: I come from the land, and have gotten my strength working on the land: and I tell thee that the land is thine to rule righteously and keep God’s peace in, and not to pledge at the pawnshop as a drunken woman pledges her children’s clothes.”

Joan uses a simile to compare the Dauphin’s debts to a drunk woman at a pawnshop. This figurative language creates a contrast between the high station of French royalty, and the base, common way that Joan believes Charles VII is acting. Her disregard for social status is underscored by her casual syntax, referring to the Dauphin by a familiar nickname—“Charlie.” Joan persuades Charles VII that he must be consecrated as king in order to truly be able to wield political power, because she sees his authority as coming directly from God.

“Mary in the blue snood, kingfisher color: will you grudge me a west wind?”

Dunois makes a religious allusion in his poetic prayer to the Virgin Mary, creating a metaphorical connection between the blue kingfisher and the blue robe that Mary was traditionally depicted wearing in medieval art. Since the kingfisher is already associated in his mind with Joan, he is drawing a connection here between Joan and Mary as well.

“If you delivered me from fear I should be a good knight for a story book, but a bad commander of the army.”

Dunois uses a parallel sentence structure to point out the irony that the knights who are the heroes of storybooks would not make effective military commanders in reality. Because Dunois is a realist, he does not value the chivalric ideals of knighthood, and this makes him an ally to Joan, whose pragmatic suggestions are dismissed by aristocratic commanders who are more concerned with their knightly reputations than with victory.

“I do not care for the things women care for. They dream of lovers, and of money. I dream of leading the charge, and of placing the big guns.”

The syntax of Joan’s declaration separates her from the category of “woman,” showing that she feels that her identity is defined more by her occupation as a soldier than her gender. Joan continues to insist upon this rhetoric, arguing that she must wear male clothing because she is a soldier, and thus her status as a woman is not relevant.

“Are these Burgundians and Bretons and Picards and Gascons beginning to call themselves French-men, just as our fellows are beginning to call themselves Englishmen? They actually talk of France and England as their countries. Theirs, if you please!”

Warwick uses a polysyndeton, a rhetorical device that repeats the same conjunction in a single sentence, in order to slow down the rhythm of the list and emphasize how many diverse regional groups are joining together to call themselves French. This final exclamation implies that the aristocratic class considers nationalism absurd because they believe only landed gentry truly own a country.

“The soul of this village girl is of equal value with yours or your king’s before the throne of God; and my first duty is to save it.”

Cauchon appeals to ethos by rhetorically framing his motivations as virtuous, compassionate, and unselfish. He indicates that he wants to capture Joan for her own good, indicating that her trial might result in her moral reform. While more politically ambitious characters like Warwick or the Dauphin see Joan as a tool to serve the interests of the powerful, Cauchon claims to be different.

“But what will it be when every girl think herself a Joan and every man a Mahomet?”

Cauchon alludes to Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, as he speculates about the impact that Joan’s heretical example might have upon Christian society. By equating Joan with a man who began a new religion, Cauchon implies that, despite Joan’s adherence to the central beliefs of Christianity, her reliance on her own judgment instead of the Church’s authority is tantamount to starting an entirely new religious tradition.

“But the voices come first; and I find the reasons after: whatever you may choose to believe.”

Joan explains to Dunois why she believes that her voices are genuinely divine, not just the product of her own rational mind. This sentence acknowledges the ambiguity surrounding Joan’s voices by acknowledging that Dunois might not believe her. By indicating that Joan experiences the voices before she comes up with rational explanations, Shaw suggests that Joan is not a deceitful person, using Christian faith to achieve political goals as the Archbishop of Rheims does, and that she truly believes God commanded her to liberate France.

“They do come to you; but you do not hear them. You have not sat in the field in the evening listening for them. When the angelus rings you cross yourself and have done with it; but if you prayed from your heart, and listened to the thrilling of the bells in the air after they stop ringing, you would hear the voices as well as I do.”

Joan’s description of her voices employs sensory detail to create an atmosphere of mysticism and emotional fervor. She refers to the bells “thrilling,” meaning trembling or quivering, suggesting that she both feels and hears the sound. This sensory language denotes that Joan’s voices are related to literal, physical sensations, and that they rely on her connection to the natural, exterior world. Joan’s devotion to listening to the bells while she is out in the fields foreshadows her later decision to die rather than live isolated from the world in prison.

“France is alone; and God is alone; and what is my loneliness before the loneliness of my country and my God?”

Joan’s speech uses an epistrophe, a literary device where a clause is repeated at the end of several phrases, in order to denote how her abandonment only serves to make her more like France and God—the two powers she serves. She asks a rhetorical question to indicate that the French court’s rejection does not bother her, because her situation is the same as her country and God.

“Heresy begins with people who are to all appearance better than their neighbors.”

The Inquisitor’s warning employs irony. The Inquisitor considers heresy to be a dangerous and negative quality, yet he acknowledges that it originates in people who are extraordinarily pious and good, subverting expectations. This irony suggests a flaw in the Church’s logic that Shaw seeks to criticize—the people who deserve praise are instead punished because they deviate from what is normal.

“What other judgement can I judge by but my own?”

Joan’s rhetorical question at her trial uses repletion to expose the absurdity of the Inquisition’s argument. By using two forms of “judge” in the same sentence, Joan’s question exposes a paradox. Since no one can judge anything using any judgment but their own, Joan suggests that every person has an equally valid interpretation of God’s commands.

“His ways are not your ways. He wills that I go through the fire to His bosom; for I am His child, and you are not fit that I should live among you. That is my last word to you.”

Joan’s final words at the end of her trial use an elevated, formal syntax, distinct from her normally casual manner of speaking. The first sentence evokes a bible quote: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways” (Isaiah 55:8). This allusion comes from a passage where God asserts that his knowledge and plans are beyond human comprehension, and Joan reminds her accusers of that, implying that they do not know what God wants even though they hold a higher station in the Church.

“None of us ever knew what anything meant to her. She was like nobody else; and she must take care of herself wherever she is; for I cannot take care of her; and neither can you, whatever you may think: you are not big enough.”

King Charles VII acknowledges Joan’s unique and extraordinary character after her death, using figurative language to indicate that Joan exceeded men of higher social status. By telling Brother Ladvenu that both of them are “not big enough,” Charles uses the metaphor of size to metaphorically claim that Joan outdid everyone else at court, including the king himself. This indicates that Charles is already aware of how Joan will eventually be remembered as more significant than himself.

“Tip top company too: emperors and popes and kings and all sorts. They chip me about giving that young judy the cross; but I don’t care: I stand up to them proper, and tell them that if she hadn’t a better right to it than they, she’d be where they are.”

The syntax of the English soldier who has gone to hell uses slang originating in Liverpool in order to communicate the class difference between the solider and the other aristocratic characters who share in the epilogue vision. His use of working-class slang such as “judy” underscores his point that all of the social classes end up in the same place eventually—Hell—proving that the kings and popes are not morally superior to the people they rule.

“Must then a Christ perish in torment in every age to save those that have no imagination?”

Cauchon uses figurative language that symbolically equates Joan to Jesus Christ. He poses a rhetorical question, although he refers to Stogumber, condemning his lack of compassion for Joan before he witnessed her violent execution. Cauchon’s question emphasizes the tragedy of martyrdom—questioning why good people must continue to suffer in order to inspire contrition in those who previously lacked empathy.