Joan by Katherine J. Chen (reviewed my Mica Corson)
The name Joan of Arc is widely known, yet most could not tell you the years she lived, the battles she fought, or almost anything about the historical context of her existence. She is admired and referenced but only through a foggy lens. In Katherine J. Chen’s novel Joan, this shining figure emerges from our vague collective memory as a flesh and blood woman.
Chen fully admits that her fictionalized version of Joan is incredibly personal. She is a vibrant character with a complicated relationship with God, while a soldier first and foremost. Many retellings of Joan of Arc depict her with visions and hallucinations of the archangel Michael. In them, she becomes another example of extreme Christian devotion, often compared to the girls who starved themselves, citing the Holy Spirit as their only sustenance, or like the monk who walked on their hands to praise Mary. However, Chen writes Joan with a distinctly modern view. This Joan is practical. Her motivations go beyond her faith. She is not just a servant of God waving a banner for France but an imposing figure of a woman - tall, strong, and empathetic to the people’s struggles.
Essayist Hilary Mantel writes that Chen made Joan of Arc a “woman for our time.” (Mantel, Cover Copy) While Joan is a work of fiction, Chen researched dozens of biographies of Joan in order to write from what inspired her, thereby creating a relatable and likable character. It explores a young woman’s fascination with war, with heart-pounding battles, shining weapons, and the overwhelming desire to survive.
Written in four parts with brief historical interludes of the events that encompass the novel, this realistic retelling begins in the small French village of Domrémy. In 1422 Joan was a ten-year-old girl known by the villagers as the one who would always lend a helping hand and would never be found in her father’s house. Jacques d’Arc, Joan’s father, is a great speaker and a great swindler who is constantly at odds with his youngest daughter. His abuse toward her was emotional and physical. This tense relationship spurs Joan’s first sincere motivation, which was the goal of leaving her stifling village and of making her own way in life.
Joan’s story begins in earnest during an incident between adolescent boys that results in a young boy’s death. This image of death, of innocence being brutally lost, resonates in her mind throughout her entire life. That childhood trauma solidified not a fear of death, but an all-encompassing resolve to survive, “She makes a promise, whispers it into the dark, imprinting it in the night sky as the boy’s face is imprinted in her memory. The promise is this: If she, Joan, has a choice, then she will choose to be a thrower of rocks. She will live.” (Chen, 25)
After the people of her village are dragged into the war between France and Britain, Joan makes her way to the city of Vaucouleurs with a specific goal. In her mind, she determined that all the pain and suffering that her loved ones have faced is caused by those keeping the countries in perpetual states of war. There were the Kings and Dukes of England and the Dauphin, who was the future king of France. Joan, at sixteen years old, is an impressive figure standing over most men. After several feats of strength, the local powers allow her to train to fight, then arrange for her to be shown to the Dauphin as a potential aid in the current war.
In the Dauphin’s court, Joan’s skills as a warrior and military leader improve rapidly. Rumors about her being a gift from God begin to swirl. They say that she was sent to help the French remove the invading English from their cities. Joan herself is skeptical of God’s role. She is a woman of some faith, but over the course of her life she questions God’s intervention. Her allies full-heartedly support the claims, and they go so far as to cite biblical prophecies, including references from legends of Merlin about a young virgin girl who will free them from war. In fact, her allies use these claims to their advantage, “A poor, unlearned woman who has run away from home with no family to protect her. What is she? Nothing? But everyone will listen to an interment of God.” (Chen, 179) Her gains in battle solidified those claims in the eyes of nobility and common people. However, Joan does not let these ideas of her define or distract her. She fights because she is good at it and sees the good in what she does. For the first time, she truly finds herself when she is a soldier, “My sword was no longer just a sword. I did not sense either the weight or the heft of it, for it was as though I were holding my own soul.” (Chen, 206)
Chen’s writing is beautiful, descriptive, and moving. Although the story describes battles, the narrative is not packed with action; rather, it is often meditative. It encapsulates the events’ intensity and richly imagines the characters. There are times when it becomes frustratingly clear how deeply rooted the misogyny of the era is, but Chen balances these moments with Joan’s practical and modern personality, establishing her odds with the sexist cultures and her perceptions on gender, “For a man cannot see anything in the world without wishing to wear it like a trophy on his back, to call himself master over it. To her, this is what it means to be a man.” (Chen, 221)
Most know the end of Joan’s story from history or perhaps the vague mention in popular culture, and there is no twist at the end of this one. But Chen embeds this character with so much life and perseverance that we can look at her short life with admiration. She is a figure remembered longer than any of the nobility that supported or abandoned her, and she was even sainted nearly five hundred years after her death. Katherine Chen’s Joan is an excellent example of history reimagined, showing us a very human portrayal of Joan of Arc with determination and an uncompromising sense of self.
Joan by Katherine J. Chen, published in 2022 by Random House. 350 pages.
Mica Corson is an avid reader and aspiring writer residing in the Pacific Northwest. She recently graduated from Central Washington University with a Professional and Creative Writing degree.