Mark Twain
Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc
eBook
( June 27, 2015)
*This Book is annotated (it contains a detailed biography of the author).
*An active Table of Contents has been added by the publisher for a better customer experience.
*This book has been checked and corrected for spelling errors.
Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, by the Sieur Louis de Conte is an 1896 novel by Mark Twain that recounts the life of Joan of Arc. It is Twain's last completed novel, published when he was 61 years old.
The novel is presented as a translation (by "Jean Francois Alden") of memoirs by Louis de Conte, a fictionalized version of Joan of Arc's page, Louis de Contes. The novel is divided into 3 sections according to Joan of Arc's development: a youth in Domrémy, a commander of the army of Charles VII of France, and a defendant at trial in Rouen.
Originally, the novel was published as a serialization in Harper's Magazine beginning in April 1895. Twain, aware of his reputation as a comic, asked that each installment appear anonymously so that readers will treat the piece seriously. Regardless, his authorship soon became known, and the book edition published by Harper and Brothers in May 1986 credited Mark Twain.