The Truth About Joan of Arc
The Truth About Joan of Arc | The Foreword and Preface to
The Retrial of Joan of Arc
by Régine Pernoud
Foreword to The Retrial of Joan of Arc: The Evidence
For Her Vindication by Régine
Pernoud | Katherine Anne Porter
In the many hundreds of books in French about the condemnation and retrial of
Joan of Arc, the authors invariably base their criticism of the first trial on
the evidence given by witnesses in the second. None of these books has been
translated into English. The French seem to write them for each other, or
perhaps even at this late day the English reader does not enjoy seeing his
nation put so soundly and irreparably in the poorest light of its history.
Whatever the reason, this is the first book based firmly on the retrial of Joan
of Arc to be translated into English, and the whole tremendous history is told
again, this time by her childhood playmates and relatives, her royal and noble
friends, her confessor, her valet, her squires and heralds, and her fellow
soldiers. There are a few of the old enemies of the first court still in Rouen,
but they can do her no more harm: and indeed their presence here perhaps lends
even a more powerful authenticity to this story than if we heard only from her
friends.
It is indeed a beautiful book, well translated, with the speed and symmetry and
direction of the life it celebrates; and besides its merit as a work of
scholarship, there is warmth and sanity in it, often absent from books about
Joan of Arc, who inspires strange fervors and theories.
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I just got this book. It's on my summer list.
Posted by: Ed Peters | Friday, May 30, 2008 at 07:58 AM