| Joan of Arc - La Pucelle (Manchester Medieval Sources) | 
 enlarge | Author: Craig Taylor
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Category: Book
List Price: £16.99
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Avg. Customer Rating:  1 reviews
Sales Rank: 107866
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 368
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.4 x 1.2
ISBN: 0719068479
Dewey Decimal Number: 920
EAN: 9780719068478
ASIN: 0719068479
Publication Date: October 30, 2006
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand New. Shipped from UK Mainland. Delivery is usually 2 - 3 working days from order by Royal Mail, International Delivery is by Airmail.
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| Customer Reviews:
The obvious starting-point for a consideration of the real Joan of Arc August 8, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I bought this book after watching the 2007 production of Bernard Shaw's "Saint Joan" at the National Theatre. I wanted to know more about this woman and I wanted to know if Shaw had got it right in his interpretation of her legend. What better place to find an answer than with this volume.
For this is not a history of Joan of Arc. Rather we have here almost three hundred pages of original historical documentation, ably translated and presented by Craig Taylor, lecturer in Medieval History at the University of York. So we can read the original voices of Joan herself and of her contemporaries, and make our own minds up as to whether Joan was saint or just plain lucky. One thing I learned was that she was not the only such figure of her time: many girls claimed to here voices from God. On a psychological level, reading these papers, I also sensed that she was perhaps a late-developing tomboy who felt at home in the company of male soldiers and the camaderie of battle. She found a purpose in life that she felt suited her well and revelled in the excitement of her new position.
Craig Taylor has split the documentation into five sections: (1) her life from when she entered the historical narrative up to her capture by the Burgundians; (2) her examination and trial in 1431; (3) commentary by her contemporaries; (4) the later posthumous re-trial in 1455-56; and finally (5) three references to her memory.
But there is more, because Craig Taylor reviews the evidence in an even-handed way in a sixty-page introduction. This provides good background information to the subject and also warns the wary reader about potential pitfalls in taking what was written by contemporaries at face-value. I enjoyed his introduction so much, I felt I had to read it twice.
This volume is an obvious starting-point for anyone interested in the life and times of Joan of Arc.
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