Saint Joan of Arc — The Folio Society | Vita Sackville-West | 1995 | First Edition | Woodcuts by Chris Daunt | Fine in Slipcase

A fine first edition of the Folio Society's 1995 publication of Saint Joan of Arc by Vita Sackville-West — one of the most celebrated biographies of the twentieth century, and a production of considerable elegance and distinction.

The story of Joan of Arc is one of the most extraordinary in all of human history. Born 6 January 1412 into an obscure peasant family in the village of Domrémy, she claimed divine visions commanding her to drive the English from France and see the Dauphin crowned at Reims. Against every conceivable obstacle — of birth, of sex, of rank, of military convention — she succeeded. Burned as a heretic at the stake in Rouen on 30 May 1431, aged no more than nineteen, she was rehabilitated posthumously, beatified in 1909, and canonised as a Saint of the Catholic Church on 16 May 1920. Nearly six centuries after her death, she remains the national heroine of France and one of the most debated and written-about figures in Western history.

Vita Sackville-West's biography, first published in 1936, stands apart from the vast literature on Joan as a work of genuine literary distinction. Sackville-West brings to her subject not only formidable scholarly rigour — drawing on the original trial transcripts and rehabilitation proceedings — but a writer's instinct for character, atmosphere, and the telling detail. The result is a biography that is simultaneously authoritative and deeply humane: clear-eyed about the historical record, yet fully alive to the charisma, the courage, and the enigma of its subject. It remains, nearly ninety years after first publication, the biography of Joan that serious readers return to.

The Folio Society's production matches the gravity of the text with an edition of quiet, assured elegance. Bound in deep navy blue cloth, the front board stamped with a single silver sword device — spare, heraldic, and entirely fitting for its subject. Silver lettering to spine. Illustrated throughout with woodcuts by the English artist Chris Daunt, placed at chapter headings; colour frontispiece portrait of Joan; blue-printed map endpapers charting the campaigns of the Hundred Years War. 339 pp., including chronological table, genealogical table, eleven appendices, bibliography, and index — a complete and scholarly apparatus that reflects the seriousness with which Folio approached this commission.

Housed in the original silver slipcase bearing Joan's original French name — Jehanne — in navy script across the front panel. A memorably conceived and quietly beautiful production.

This first edition copy is in fine condition throughout — cloth bright and entirely unmarked, pages clean, fresh and unopened in feel, binding tight and square. The silver slipcase has one very small surface mark to one panel, as visible in photographs, but is otherwise sound, clean, and complete, with the book itself entirely unaffected.

A distinguished piece for collectors of Folio Society editions, medieval and French history, the history of the Hundred Years War, or the life and work of Vita Sackville-West — one of the most gifted and fascinating women writers of the twentieth century.