When Mark Twain wrote a novel about St. Joan of Arc, he left us one of the great conundrums of American literature.
Twain knew the book would confuse readers who expected his usual fare: when Harper’s Magazine first released installments of the novel beginning in 1895, he insisted it be published anonymously.
Today, fans of Twain still find themselves scratching their heads. How did the creator of American icons like Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn come to write the life and death of a fifteenth-century French girl? Why would a man with so strained a relationship to Christianity write such an earnest novel about a Roman Catholic martyr? Since when did the great American humorist become a hagiographer?
The mysteries multiply when we open the book. We find almost nothing like the vernacular sparkle or outrageous humor of Twain’s better-known works. His research is meticulous; his prose remains predominantly serious, even reverent, as he crafts a novelistic biography of the girl known as the “Maid of Orleans.” What’s more, Twain claimed Joan of Arc as his favorite among all his many books, and insisted in his autobiography, “I wrote the book for love, not money.” It’s a massive novel, and one that took him—by his own estimates—over a decade of research and preparation. And on every page we find the author’s utter admiration for this visionary Catholic saint.
On a bookshelf of Twain’s complete works, one of these things is not like the other.
The story begins with Joan, a simple peasant girl in the sleepy village of Domremy. France has long been riven by the bloody Hundred Years’ War with England. Charles VII, the rightful king of France, remains still-uncrowned and influenced by a corrupted court. But God has a plan for Joan and a plan for France. Led by what she calls her “Voices”—miraculous visions and instructions from St. Michael and other saints—Joan presents herself to the king with the message that God has sent her to save France.
And France begins to awaken. Again and again, the English armies meet their match in Joan. One by one, English fortifications fall. The oppressed people of France have hope again, and God fights against the English invaders through the sword of a young girl in dazzling white armor.
The facts of the story seem stranger than fiction, but they’re all true. Twain later insisted, “I never attributed an act to the Maid herself that was not strictly historical, and I never put a sentence in her mouth which she had not uttered.”
For Twain, part of Joan’s genius lies in her simple faith in God. Confident in His power to overcome all obstacles, Joan embraces His call. “I am enlisted,” she says, “I will not turn back, God helping me, till the English grip is loosed from the throat of France.” And obstacles there will be, for Joan faces ineptitude, opposition, and even deception from within the ranks of her own army.
But Twain also seems drawn to Joan’s miraculous gifts. Although a literary Realist and a religious skeptic, the author nonetheless treats all of Joan’s visions and prophecies with remarkable seriousness. Joan predicts that a mysterious sword will be found buried behind the altar of a church. She prophesies her victories, and even when she will be wounded in battle.
Indeed, part of Joan’s mystique for Twain is the seemingly-irrefutable evidence of God’s supernatural power in her life and career. Twain’s skepticism might lead him to raise an eyebrow at organized religion, but as a literary Realist he desires to represent reality as it truly is. By itself, Joan’s singular military success cannot be fully explained. Beyond that, for Twain the documents of Joan’s famous trial in 1431, and the “Rehabilitation” proceedings after her death represent a complete, legal, and trustworthy source for her biography. What emerges from these extensive trial documents, eyewitness accounts, and manuscripts is simply St. Joan of Arc, with all her holiness, her prophecies, and her visions. And the facts point unmistakably to God’s power. It is as if Twain’s commitment to Realism defeats his skepticism. Posing as the fictional translator Jean François Alden, Twain writes in his prefatory note to the novel:
The details of the life of Joan of Arc form a biography which is unique among the world’s biographies in one respect: It is the only story of a human life which comes to us under oath, the only one which comes to us from the witness-stand.”
Joan’s well-documented life, then, becomes a kind of case study for God’s activity in human life and history.
But Joan’s life reveals her natural gifts as well, and Twain cherishes those qualities in her. He depicts her amazing leadership, especially her ability to transform fallen men into heroes. To one of her childhood companions, a boastful coward known mockingly as “the Paladin,” she says calmly, “Of old you were a fantastic talker, but there is a man in you, and I will bring it out. . . Will you follow where I lead?” As the narrator, based on Joan’s page and secretary Louis de Contes, puts it: the Maid was “supremely great in the gift of firing the hearts of hopeless men with noble enthusiasms, the gift of turning hares into heroes, slaves and skulkers into battalions that march to death with songs upon their lips.” In this way, Joan looks upon men with God’s eyes. Seeing the greatness to which each man is called, she reaches out her hand and challenges him to stand up. We could all use a little Joan of Arc in our lives.
But Twain also reminds us that Joan was just a girl, and a peasant girl at that. She takes pride in her sewing skills; she believes in fairies; she cannot read or write. And despite her divine calling to crush the English armies, her heart breaks at the carnage of war. After Joan wins a terrible battle for an English fortress, the narrator finds her
sitting among a ruck of corpses, with her face in her hands, crying—for she was a young girl, you know, and her hero-heart was a young girl’s heart too, with the pity and the tenderness that are natural to it. She was thinking of the mothers of those dead friends and enemies.”
But if Twain’s Joan of Arc has deep tenderness, she also has astonishing courage. She speaks her mind to kings and bishops. She charges when her own army retreats. She gets shot by a crossbow, but by nightfall she leads another attack. And throughout the tale, the narrator, writing now as an old man, foreshadows the final test of her terrible bravery: martyrdom at the stake. Once, when Joan enters a city to the cheers of admiring crowds, her military banner catches fire from a nearby torch, and she puts out the flame with her bare hand. The crowd erupts, in words that readers recognize as a somber prophecy: “She’s not afraid of fire nor anything!”
Indeed, her final battle will be her long trial at the hands of corrupt church officials. Captured in combat and handed over to her enemies the English, Joan faces a hostile ecclesial court led by a bishop loyal to the Burgundian party, which supported English occupation. Twain’s narrator heaps scorn upon this kangaroo court. But he also makes a distinction between the crooked politicking of the French church and the Church proper.
France was not the Church. Rome had no interest in the destruction of this messenger of God. Rome would have given her a fair trial, and that was all her cause needed. From that trial she would have gone forth free and honored and blest.”
Twain glories in Joan’s simple intelligence and wisdom, as she calmly faces her interrogators. Her persecutors do everything they can to discredit and condemn the Maid as a heretic or a witch. They ask her about her divine calling, her miraculous “Voices,” about her choice of male attire. They threaten her with the rack. They deny her Holy Communion. But Joan insists upon her visions and her mission. Violating the privacy of her conscience and seeking to draw her into presumption, one of her accusers asks her if she is in the state of Grace. Twain records Joan’s “immortal answer” in italics: “If I be not in a state of Grace, I pray God place me in it; if I be in it, I pray God keep me so.”
But in the end, her enemies condemn her to death. At her place of execution, she kneels to pray for the French king. And then Twain’s little Maid of Orleans is given over to the flames of the stake, until the eternal flame of God’s Love receives her forever.
Mark Twain was still alive when the Church beatified Joan of Arc in 1909. To a certain extent, his novel remains a puzzling act of devotion from a complicated man. For the great American author, there was no one like St. Joan. He marveled at her confidence in God’s Will, her courage, her simplicity. And in her he saw an example for all time. We can hear Twain’s own voice in the words of his narrator describing Joan: “It took six thousand years to produce her; her like will not be seen in the earth again in fifty thousand. Such is my opinion.”
Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc
by Mark Twain
Ignatius Press, 2007
Paperback, 452 pages
(Editor’s note: This review was originally posted on June 29, 2018.)
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This is by far the best article i have seen about Mark Twain’s most unusual book.
If you ever find yourself with a few spare hours in Hartford, Connecticut, I urge you to visit the Mark Twain House and Museum and take the tour of his house, which is well-preserved. Older Catholics may smile at the little lecture given by the talented tour guide before you tour the house. The rules are quite clear, and if you are old enough, you might think to yourself that the standards just announced for acceptable behavior in Mark Twain’s house are more stringent than those of the current Catholic Church for acceptable behavior in the presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
For me, one of the most touching moments in the tour of Samuel Clemens’ house was the display of the basket of food items given to about fifty poor families in Hartford at Christmas each year, and the hand-written apology given when financial circumstances at one time made it necessary for the basket to be not quite as good as it had been in previous years. If you take the museum tour, you will see the printing press that was a bad investment, reduced Christmas baskets resulting.
I agree with you it’s a great article. I’m now going to order the book!
Ive never been to Mark Twain’s home but I did make a detour once to visit his gravesite.
Thank you so much for sharing that about his Christmas basket of food for the poor. I’ve learned more about famous people from the little random details of their lives than from their biographies. Sometimes you can only learn about those at the actual places where they lived or died. It can really make a difference in understanding them.
It is such a great book. Such an astonishing story.
Twain licks you in with the very first story of the fairy tree, and the day when her village gave the little girl Joan the title: Joan the Brave.
None of the movies about Joan do her justice.
Twain does…because he loved her.
Superb review, Professor; & Twain was right, t’was his finest work.
What a wonderful review of a fascinating fascination, an unlikely but inspiring devotion. Thank you to the author of this essay, and also for the reader comments.
Apparently, an inspiration for Mark Twain in his portrayal of Joan of Arc was one of his daughters, Susy.
It’s interesting to me that Susy’s short life of 24 years coincided almost exactly with the life of another young woman in France who was also precocious, creative, highly sensitive, strong-willed and devoted to her father — St. Therese of Lisieux.
I don’t know if there’s a book to be written of these two women in comparison and contrast, but I put it out there just in case.
On a somewhat related topic, Mark Twain may have known Nathaniel Hawthorne’s daughter, Rose, who converted to Catholicism, eventually became a nun, and founded an order devoted to caring for patients with incurable cancer. I have the impression somehow that Twain contributed to her ministry.
As a postscript, I had just purchased a biography of Mark Twain by Ron Powers, which I hope is as good as it is long.
Well Vida Sackville West wrote an excellent & comprehensive bio of Joan as well as The Eagle & The Dove it being a twinned bio of St Teresa of Avila and St Therese of Liseux. West was an agnostic & allegedly Virginia Wolf’s sometime lover. Her appraisal of The Little Flower is remarkable in that it was partly worked on the pre 1956 translation of Therese’s autobiography which was heavily edited / altered / often mangled, by her older sister Pauline.
It is perhaps in the honoring of the saints that we see glimpses of their salvation. Though outside the Catholic Church, they are saved through the Catholic Church — with the inspiration and aid of her most celebrated members. Let’s hope and pray that this happens to as many non-Catholic souls as possible.
Vita Sackville-West wrote a singularly lousy biography of St. Joan, poisoned by the author’s one perverted view of life.
More (or less) than a “literary realist and religious sceptic,” Twain is also known to be an historical determinist. But, then, along comes the anomaly, Joan…an undeniable exception of human freedom that could overturn closed determinism (a theme in Andrew Tadie’s introduction to the 1989 Ignatius printing).
On this point, novelist Twain is a kind of Galileo who broke open cosmology by simply noticing another anomaly—moons circling around Jupiter. Twain bumped into the world-changing implication of even one truly free person in history, like Joan of Arc. With even one solitary exception determinism is doomed.
In Twain’s Tom Sawyer, the vagrant Injun Joe is trapped in a cave and is found dead only one day after he has expired from dehydration, on the wrong side of the sealed cave door. His only source of water had been a small hollow in a rock underneath a cave dripping. Had the hollow been any larger he would have had enough water to live one more day until rescue. But the cup had been sized by geologic action beginning tens of thousands of years before. His insignificant fate in the grand scheme of things was already rigged from eons before—determined.
Dr. Franklin concludes with Twain beginning to wonder afresh about the big picture: “It took six thousand years to produce her; her like will not be seen in the earth again in fifty thousand. Such is my opinion.”
The courage of Samuel Clemens in delving deeply into the truth and then publishing it is certainly an anomaly in our times. Today, the skeptics and doubters simply look the other way or else they use their imaginations to come up with fantastical explanations that defy logic to support their denial of the truth.
After reading this professor’s review, I cannot wait to read the book.
Thank you, Dr. Franklin.
Thank you!
By the mid 1800’s a lot would have gone into making Samuel Clemens “a complicated man” – the reformation, the enlightenment, the rise of modernism and such. However, the grace of God always manages to peek through such “complications”. Only that grace, working behind the scenes, can explain the historical yet devotional masterpiece Twain composed.
‘ A complex man..’ – elaborated bit more at the Wiki site , including him having been a Freemason , ? the related fear / despair of hell and ? hatred towards Christianity … not letting in The Light of Truth from the Heart of The Mother , as the Handmaid of The Lord , standing at the foot of The Cross ,finding strength in His Will trusting same is to transform the fear and hatred in hearts into flames of Love and holiness , as precursors for the life of heaven ..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain
? some caution needed , for the title of ‘father ‘ of American literature .. breaking the admonition of The Lord , not to call any one – ‘ on earth ‘ , with the related values as ‘father ‘ !
Apologies for sounding bit like those who made the accusations against St.Joan – can imagine how the blood lines / lives through wars and migrations and all could have intersected in lives of the saint and the author , how in His mercy , her prayers too inviting many to help bring the dew of deeper trust in His Love for the departed souls , as the nation observes the ‘Memorial Day’ .
http://www.comingofthekingdom.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/45-Purgatory.pdf
May same protect all who could be influenced even subtly by any anti Catholic fears and darkness through all media influences , instead for the prayers of the Mother and Queen of The Divine Will to help the auroras of the Divine Light to rise in many souls !
1. “Father” here is a metaphor only, used to suggest Twain’s status
2. As for interpreting the Biblical term of “father,” what we need to do first of all is realize how absurd it is to begin with a literalist spin on the term. One simple way to do that is to ask yourself what you call your earthly father. And then ask yourself, Is Jesus really telling me not to call my biological father by that title? Should I call him only “male parental unit,” let’s say? Or call him only by his first name? Or by his surname, preceded by “Mr.”?
This article strongly implies that Joan of Arc “led” in place of men and also fought in combat, but she denied both (she said her carried her banner and stayed out of the fighting, and denied calling herself a commander), and the Royal records list the actual command structure (all noblemen). The article claims she believed in fairies, but she denied that too, as I recall. And although Twain’s novel was certainly honest about things that Twain didn’t want to believe (such as the eyewitness accounts of Joan’s accurate prophecies, and English manipulation of her trial), nonetheless he made up huge amounts of stuff (“the Paladin” is fictional, as are in fact most of the characters and most of Joan’s dialogue).
I think one of the most moving statues of St. Joan is located at Fort Drum, home of the 10th Mountain Div. It depicts St. Joan comforting a dying English soldier. Words cannot express what statue conveys.
***
https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2015/07/the-pieta-of-joan-of-arc
The author singles out the fact that Twain distinguishes between the Church in Rome and the Church in France. And further, it was the latter that responsible for putting her to death. (Not that they are in principle two separate entities.)
Even so, the paradox of Twain’s tribute to St. Joan remains. Twain apparently sees “the seemingly-irrefutable evidence of God’s supernatural power in her life and career,” as the author notes. What he [Twain] does not see, I think, is that it is both the Incarnate Word and the Church–in its vastness, complexity, and failings in the temporal world–that produced her.
Twain apparently had little use for organized religion, whether Catholic or Protestant in form. And that is not so very hard to understand. But a consistent, hard-headed realism should have instructed him in the seeming contradiction in terms stated in the previous paragraph. Twain, however, was both a realist and a romantic. We see the two at play in Huckleberry Finn, for instance.
As for his tribute to St. Joan, we see more of his “romantic” side, which is not to say that his portrait of Joan is false, unreal, fictional, etc. Not at all. It points to the ultimate reality over and above and behind this world.
I read the book. A nineteen-year-old girl defeats the top English general of those times, using a most brilliant strategy. She never killed anyone, yet to claim that she didn’t engage in battle is a stretch. The bishop who viewed her in her cell through a peep-hole, while her guards . . . Well, she is in the Blessed Realm, while they remain in Purgatory, working out their salvation, which could take quite a few lives. Twain believed in decency and civilization. That is why he set forth this example of a truly decent human against a back-drop of men who acted more like animals. Twain’s friend, Tesla, was the son, and also grandson, of Orthodox priests.
Twain’s era was a time of recognition for St. Joan. His book on her was probably the favorite book I read during my high school years. Even Bernard Shaw was moved to write a fair play about her.
I believe that Twain’s well known disdain for organized religion actually made him most admiring of Joan. He saw hypocrisy in churches that contrasted sharply with Joan’s simple faith and devotion. That he wrote such an insightful work is a tribute to his ability to see below the surface and appreciate the character and virtue of Joan.
I think Twain found a moment of relief from his depressing materialism, but in the end he still encapsulated Joan’s response to gratuitous grace as really nothing more than a project of evolution: ” “It took six thousand years to produce her; her like will not be seen in the earth again in fifty thousand. Such is my opinion.”
See my above comment of May 30, 2020.
Was Mark Twain a Mason?
Yes. See James Day’s August 2021 CWR article, “Mark Twain, Freemason”.
This is my favorite book of my sixty nine years breathing.
My impression at the end was that Twain, after his long investigation in France of St Joan’s life, might have fallen in love with the subject of his book. And Twain was no friend of religion.
Joan foretold the date that she would be wounded, “as much as seven weeks” prior, and again, twice, two weeks before — as was recorded at that time. “Rise early, and be by me all the day. There will be much work on my hands, and I shall be hurt between my neck and my shoulder.”
“The iron bolt was still in the wound–some say it projected out behind the shoulder.”
“The wound was forgotten in a moment.”
“Joan mounted her horse now, with her staff about her, and when our people saw us coming they raised a great shout, and were at once eager for another assault on the boulevard.”
People these days don’t believe in a thing of this nature as being possible — or even relevant.
Although the name “Joan” is said to be derived from Hebrew, and means “God is gracious,” “Joan of Arc” makes me think of the name “Jonah,” which refers to a female dove, and the word “Ark.” There was the dove on the Ark, of course. Jonah was tasked with preaching to the Assyrians.
Mark Twain is usually pictured wearing his trademark white suit, until late in his life. He viewed a few institutions as being the cause of trouble in society. So, he didn’t belong to an organized religion, but that doesn’t exclude the possibility that he had a moral compass and the belief in God. How many professing Christians are more like wolves in the clothing of sheep?
Johah was swallowed by a big fish.
Dr. Franklin is mistaken when he says “The story begins with Joan, a simple peasant girl in the sleepy village of Domremy.” No. It began with the murderous English armies who invaded France. If there is a parallel between the martyrdom of Joan and the story of Jesus– (firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2015/07/the-pieta-of-joan-of-arc), it would be very uneven. The so-called artists at the Globe in London might be surprised to learn that England was defeated for all time when they burned Joan. The English were ghoulish barbarians, and were codified as such. Doomed as whelps of the human genus,
the English dead walk the earth to this day. Their ghoulish descendants have populated the planet. Look at their faces! Ralph Nader. Nancy Pelosi. Chuck Shumer. God’s hand was on them with Joan, and she showed us what they are. How many dead, Lord?
I just finished reading Twain’s book about Joan of Arc and loved it. I have been a Mark Twain fan since childhood. I don’t think the book is his masterpiece–I think Huckleberry Finn is the masterpiece because of the dignity that it gives a black man a hero, through brilliant satirical writing that makes it impossible to think of “Jim” as an “inferior”–the truth about black people and indeed, all people, was and still is needed in the U.S. In my opinion, Joan of Arc had a lot of that same “on the surface floweriness,” but underneath the surface, the ring of beautiful truth. I think that Catholic high schools should assign this book along with Huckleberry Finn–Twain was a great American writer and his books should be read and discussed by all Americans.
. . . because of all the women he knew and had known, Joan of Arc
was the [first? and] only woman who didn’t fail but remained true
[yet truly woman] in her speech and witness under [rigged] trial
and death by burning at the stake. Today, according to one survey,
women utter 300,000 words a day; men 100,000 less
The best picture of St. Joan is the one she and her companions left us in the transcripts of her trials which are available in English editions. As for cinema, the silent 1928 PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC directed by Carl Dreyer is one of the greatest films ever made. The script is closely based on the transcript of her heresy trial. A beautiful restored version is available on DVD.
As for fighting, Joan testified that she had not killed anyone but she did unhorse an enemy knight. She sent his valuable armor as a gift to a church.