Away to Your Own Country, by Joan of Arc

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I AM sent here by God, the King of heaven, body for body, to drive you out of all France. And all who are willing to go I will receive to mercy. And do not have confidence in God, the King of heaven, son of the blessed Mary; for you shall not have the realm of France; but God, the King of heaven, wills that King Charles, the true heir, shall have it, and the Maid has revealed this to him. He shall enter Paris with a good company. If you will not believe the news that the Maid brings from God, in whatsoever place we find you we will attack you, and will make a greater slaughter than there has been in France in a thousand years, if you will not do right. And believe that the King of heaven will send more strength to the Maid than you can bring in all your assaults against her and her good soldiers. And it shall be clearly seen who has the best right from the King of heaven.*

by Joan of Arc ?1410-1429

From ‘Readings in English History Drawn from the Original Sources’ (1908, 1922) edited Edward Potts Cheyney (1861-1947).

* Contrary to the impression she gave, Joan’s belief that Charles VII and the House of Valois had the best right to the French crown was not widely shared. Charles’s realm was a relatively small region around Bourges, and much of France still honoured the Treaty of Troyes, signed in 1420 by Henry V and Charles VI, which had promised the crown to Henry and his heirs. But it is human nature to be flattered by attention; and it seemed to France that Henry VI was as indifferent as the Maid was passionate. French support for the English crown began to trickle away, and evaporated after 1435.

Précis

Joan told the English that if they obeyed her order to quit France, they would save their lives; but if they resisted, they would be resisting not only Charles VII, in her eyes the only rightful king, but God himself, and by her hand God would visit destruction on them wherever they may be in the land.

Questions for Critics

1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?

2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate her ideas more effectively?

3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?

Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.

Précis

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