Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Saint Joan, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Institutions and the Corruption of Integrity
Gender
Sanity vs. Madness
The Quest for Personal Knowledge
Summary
Analysis
An organ plays in the cathedral of Rheims after Charles’s coronation. Joan, dressed in men’s clothing, kneels before the stations of the cross displayed on a pillar. Dunois enters and tells Joan that there are people outside who want to see her, but she declines to leave, wanting the newly crowned King Charles VII to “have all the glory.” Joan expresses gratitude for Dunois’s friendship, and he admits that she needs it: despite the knights’ acceptance and respect for Joan, the court has begun to see her as an enemy. In her confidence and ambition, she is perpetually “shewing them up,” and they are resentful of her. It was Joan and not the Archbishop who crowned Charles VII King, for example.
By crowning the Dauphin king herself, Joan again challenges the Church’s authority. Throughout the play, Joan is repeatedly blinded by her confidence, unaware of how her self-assurance plays on the insecurities of the powerful men with whom she interacts. Shaw’s use of the phrase “shewing them up” demonstrates one of his idiosyncrasies as a writer: throughout his career, he persistently resisted conforming to standard English usage, in this case demonstrated by replacing “show” with the archaic spelling “shew.”
Themes
Joan tells Dunois that she wants to “take Paris” next, but Dunois cautions her that many would rather see Joan defeated than see Joan victorious at Paris. Joan calls the world “wicked.” She laments that the only thing she can rely on are her voices. Dunois responds uncomfortably to this: were it not for Joan’s successful military endeavors, her incessant talk of “voices” would make him think that she’s mad. Offended by Dunois’s skepticism, Joan insists that “the voices come first; and I find the reasons after.”
Joan feels alienated because she seems to be the only character driven solely by her own conviction (symbolized by her voices) as opposed to the interests of a larger, external institution. Dunois accepts Joan’s voices because they have resulted in French victory, but he would be less willing to do so if the voices weren’t benefiting him in an obvious way. Joan is aware of this: when she states that “the voices come first; and I find the reasons after,” she means that she consciously adjusts the framing of her voices’ instructions to suit the interests of those with whom she must cooperate. Joan’s confidence insures that she doesn’t need to “find the reasons” to justify the voices to herself, but she recognizes that she must present logical “reasons” for her voices, lest others accuse her of madness.
Themes
Literary Devices
King Charles, Bluebeard, and La Hire enter the cathedral. Charles complains about how heavy his robes are and how horrible holy oil smells. Joan approaches Charles and tells him of her plans to return home. Reluctant to return to a life of boring normalcy, she suggests to Dunois that they should take Paris before she leaves. This alarms Charles, who would rather establish a treaty with the Duke of Burgundy than continue fighting and risk defeat. The Archbishop enters the cathedral and condemns Joan for her lack of humility. She responds to this defensively and disrespectfully, causing the Archbishop to accuse her of “the sin of pride.” Charles seconds this, complaining that Joan thinks she’s better and smarter than everyone else.
Joan’s defensive, disrespectful response to the Archbishop shows that she’s ignorant of how off-putting her confidence is to others. Joan’s sole quest throughout the play is to act on the truth, and she refuses to yield to anyone whose ignorance or hesitation contradicts her convictions. Shaw emphasizes Joan’s ignorance here to set up how unequipped and unprepared she will be to defend herself during her trial in Scene VI.
Themes
Literary Devices
Joan asserts that she knows she’s right because her voices tell her so. Additionally, her decision to act on her voices’ orders has given the French numerous military victories. Dunois cautions Joan to be pragmatic: God might have been on their side when he brought them wind at Orleans, but it’s foolish to presume he will always be on their side. Still, Joan remains confident in God: he’s protected her before, and he will protect her now.
Joan offers logical explanations to legitimize her voices: she is right to be confident in them, because acting on their orders has resulted in numerous French victories. Dunois more readily accepts the victories Joan as brought France than Joan’s willingness to claim responsibility for these victories. Dunois’s unwillingness to accept Joan’s role in France’s recent victories betrays his own insecurity at being upstaged by Joan, which highlights how gender bias prevents others from regarding her objectively.
Themes
Literary Devices
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The Archbishop warns Joan that “pride will have a fall,” and that the Church will “burn [her] as a witch” for her heresy. Joan can’t believe that anybody could punish her for telling the truth. She enlists the Archbishop to defend her, but he refuses to do so if she continues to be “proud and disobedient.” Joan resists the Archbishop’s criticisms She’s not being undeservingly proud, because she has always been right, and “your earthly counsels always wrong.”
Joan is correct when she states that she has always been right and the “earthly counsels always wrong,” but the Archbishop refuses to acknowledge the validity that lies at the core in Joan’s statement, focusing instead on the “proud and disobedient” manner in which Joan delivers the truth.
Themes
Ultimately, everyone decides that Joan’s confidence is unfounded and foolish. The Archbishop assures her that the Church, the army, and the crown will disown her if she continues to value her own “private judgement” above the judgement of the Church.
Everybody besides Joan professes loyalty to their respective institutions: the Archbishop to the Church, Dunois to the military, and the Dauphin to the monarchy. Joan alone remains loyal to her own “private judgement.”
Themes
Frustrated, Joan cries out that she has “always been alone.” She’d thought that she would find people sympathetic to her cause in the French court, as she fights in the name of God and “God ha[s] friends everywhere,” but she was wrong: Joan—like France and like God—is all alone. Still, Joan refuses to give up: if God’s strength is in his loneliness, so, too, will be hers. She resolves to turn away from the authority figures who hate and abandon her and turn toward “the common people,” whose love and acceptance will comfort her. Even if she is burned at the stake, she will be remembered in the hearts of these common people.
Joan’s alienation reflects how rare it is to maintain personal integrity in the face of institutional pressures in a corrupt, morally imperfect world. By aligning herself with God and France, Joan proposes an opposition between the purity and goodness of a “common people” and the corruption of people in positions of power.
Themes
Joan leaves. Bluebeard and Dunois admit that, although she is foolish, her passion inspires them. La Hire says he’d very well “follow her to hell when the spirit rises in her like that.” The Archbishop admits that “there is a dangerous power in her outburst” which complicates his own spiritual judgment. Charles wishes Joan would just be quiet and stop digging herself into a hole.
The fact that nobody dismisses Joan outright suggests that, although they are morally conflicted to abandon her, they know that it is in their best interest to maintain the status quo. Joan’s refusal to see this illustrates both her moral superiority and ignorance of the corrupt forces that control her world.
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