Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc

The fruit of Twain's own twelve years of research, written over the course of two years, and regarded by Twain himself as the best and most significant of his many books, Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc is a beautifully told chronicle of history and sanctity, exhilaratingly entertaining and profoundly moving.

Joan of Arc, a mere child in years, ignorant, impoverished, unimportant, one day heard the voices of God's messengers. Their message: that she-by God's command, in His protection, and by His strength-was to lead France's armies in war, win back the nation from its foreign oppressor, and set the crown upon the head of its true king. Yet with France's soldiers disheartened and dispersed, her peoples helpless and hopeless, her king irresolute and indifferent, surely hope-like the spirit of France itself-was dead. So it seemed, until Joan restored them to life and they rose to follow her, into battle, on to victory. And her reward for this? To be tried, tested, and ultimately betrayed by the same men who ought to have had care, not contempt, for her immortal soul. Condemned a heretic, Joan died a martyr and yet she lives on, not merely as a hero of war, but as a saint of God-the God who called her out of Domrémy and into his own wonderful light.