Saint Joan

Tables, which Shaw writes very purposely into Saint Joan’s stage directions, represent institutional order. Tables appear throughout the play to symbolize the power and influence of the social institutions actively at play in any given scene. People who sit around tables usually have close ties to powerful institutions like the Church or the government, so whenever a table is present in Saint Joan, it’s Shaw’s way of reinforcing to the reader how heavily institutions influence characters’ worldviews and actions and how the need to assert institutional power and maintain the status quo can corrupt their otherwise morally sound intentions. A notable example of this is in Scene IV, which features a philosophically rich dialogue between Cauchon and Warwick. During this scene, the men sit at a table at an English camp and discuss the threat Joan poses to their separate institutions (Stogumber is there as well, though he lacks the mental capacity to contribute anything significantly insightful). Although Cauchon and Warwick begin their dialogue opposed to and unimpressed with the other’s concerns—Warwick is invested in the problems Joan poses for the feudal structure, and Cauchon is invested in those she presents for the Church—they end their debate by compromising their ideals in order to meet in the middle and increase their chances of overtaking Joan, whom they ultimately come to see as posing a similar threat to the integrity of their respective institutions. Shaw’s decision to have this moment of moral compromise unfold at a table emphasizes its significance to Saint Joan’s thematic exploration of corruption within institutions of power .