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Unit 23: Saint Joan: Detailed Analysis of the Text

Objectives Notes

After studying this unit, you will be able to:
• Describe the summary of all the scenes;
• Illustrate the analysis of all the scenes;
• Analyse in detail the text of preface, scenes I to scenes VI and epilogue.

Introduction

George Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan was first produced in New York City in 1923 and in London in
1924. Shaw published it with a long Preface in 1924. When word came out that Shaw, who was
known as an irreverent jokester, was writing about a Christian saint and martyr, there were fears
that he would not be able to produce something appropriate, but the early reception of the play was
generally favorable, although some commentators criticized him for historical inaccuracy and for
being too talky or comic. Over the years, the play, a rare tragic work in his generally comic oeuvre,
has been seen as one of his greatest and most important. It has been hailed as being intellectually
exciting and praised for dealing with important themes, such as nationalism, war, and the relation
of the individual to society. The play solidified Shaw’s reputation as a major playwright and helped
win him the Nobel Prize in 1925. This unit elaborates the text of the play in detail from preface scene
I to scene VI and epilogue. More emphasis is given on the detailed analysis of the text in all the
scenes.

23.1 Preface

23.1.1 Summary

Shaw briefly recounts the barest biographical facts regarding Joan, and proceeds to anoint her as an
exemplar of Protestantism, Nationalism, Realism, Feminism, and Rationalism. Shaw claims that,
above all other real or perceived offenses, Joan was burned for her “presumption.” People received
Joan as either “miraculous” or “unbearable” because, like Socrates and even Jesus of Nazareth (but
unlike Napoleon Bonaparte) before her, she did not understand the penalty paid by those who
“show up” their supposed superiors: “[T]he strange superiority of Christ and the fear it inspires
elicit a shriek of Crucify Him from all who cannot divine its benevolence.”
In contrast to much of the hagiography Shaw sees surroundings of Joan; he judges her trial to have
been a fair one, given the medieval worldview. He is not concerned with rehabilitating her character
so much as he is concerned with restoring her humanity; he attempts not to demonstrate Joan’s
righteousness-”The mud that was thrown at her had dropped off by this time so completely that
there is no need for any modern writer to wash up after it”-as to rehabilitate, to some degree, those
who tried, judged, and condemned her. Joan’s “ideal biographer,” Shaw decrees, “must be free
from nineteenth century prejudices and biases; must understand the Middle Ages, the Roman
Catholic Church, and the Holy Roman Empire much more intimately than our Whig historians
have ever understood them; and must be capable of throwing off sex partialities and their romance,
and regarding women as the female of the human species, and not as a different kind of animal
with specific charms and specific imbecilities.” In short, Shaw proposes that, to truly understand
Joan and the events in which she became embroiled and which she precipitated, one must first truly
understand her historic, social, and intellectual context.

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