When Chappell Roan descended upon the VMA black carpet earlier this month in a sheer dress from Y/Project’s 2024 collection, adorned with a crucifix necklace, chain-metal accessories, a cape and a sword (both on her nails and in hand), it was immediately apparent who she sought to evoke. Dubbed ‘Roan of Arc’, as she took to the stage to perform her hit single “Good Luck, Babe!” clad in armour, there was no mistaking the Midwestern Princess’s inspiration: Joan of Arc, the patron saint of France.
Since Joan’s execution in 1431 and her canonisation as a saint in 1920, the Maid of Orléans has been a recurring figure in music, fashion, television and film. There’s Luc Besson’s 2000 film The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc, starring actress and model Milla Jovovich, tracks by both Leonard Cohen and Arcade Fire bearing her name, as well as “Bigmouth Strikes Again” by The Smiths, where Morrissey sings the infamous line: “And now I know Joan of Arc felt”.
lorde as joan of arc for the guardian pic.twitter.com/om9Ooum3IX
— persephone (@peterseepeterdo) August 4, 2019
For many, Joan of Arc is regarded as both a feminist and genderqueer icon, labels that, of course, didn’t exist in her lifetime. At 13, she began hearing the voices of saints and experiencing visions, and somehow, the teenage girl convinced Charles VII to let her lead his armies and help him regain the throne. After leading the French army to victory at the siege of Orléans, she secured Charles’s coronation and ended English claims to the throne. At 16, after taking a vow of chastity, Joan publicly defied her father’s attempts to make her marry, defending herself in court and winning. Most famously, she was burned at the stake by the English in 1431, convicted of heresy, witchcraft and the “crime” of wearing men’s clothes. Many believe she adopted male attire to protect herself from the threat of rape; she testified that she did so at God’s command. To countless artists, historians and admirers, Joan’s story is most greatly understood through her defiance of gender norms and her youth.
Before her canonisation by the Roman Catholic Church, Joan became a symbol for the British suffrage movement in the early 20th century. Despite having fought against the English, the suffragettes seized upon her as a powerful political tool because of the unique way she combined Christian idealism with militancy. Joan’s image adorned banners and pins, and women marched in her likeness. Today, Joan has joined the ranks of historical women who have been turned into tragic feminist heroes that young women idolise. From Marie Antoinette, Anne Boleyn, Sylvia Plath and even Francesca Woodman, these women have become part of, as several X users described, the “female Roman empire”. They are women who died young, misunderstood and wronged by men. When you type in their names on TikTok, you can find videos of young women making pilgrimages to their graves, execution sites and homes. Recently, graduate art historian Jes posted a video from her trip to France, visiting the site where Joan was executed, captioning the video with the phrase, “She was just a girl,” while looking mournfully at a statue of the saint.
The phrase “she was just a girl” is often used ironically, highlighting how women are expected to underperform because of their gender. In this case, Jes used it to underscore Joan’s age. While the concept of “the teenager” didn’t emerge until 1944, Joan, by today’s understanding, was a teenage girl whose defiance of her gender led to her death. While Joan is mourned for her short time on this earth, it is also one of the reasons young women like Jes deify her. Like Plath and Woodward, their ability to remain girls forever through death makes them figures to admire – and be envious of. As Thessaly La Force wrote for the New York Times, “Our culture tends to worship, to a cultish degree, those female artists whose lives ended all too soon.” She continues: “It is never as often as we would like that a beautiful and brilliant woman steps away from her assigned role of helpmeet, of mother, of daughter and muse. So we celebrate the ones who we believe – on some artistic plane – were set free.”
While Joan is revered as a feminist heroine in the US and UK, her legacy is more contentious in her homeland. “I thought it was quite interesting when Zendaya dressed as Joan at the Met Gala in 2018 because if you showed pictures of her to a French person, they would have questioned why she would dress up as a figure who has become a fascist, far-right symbol in France,” French writer, video essayist and author Alice Cappelle explains to Dazed. Since the early 80s, France’s far-right party, the National Front (FN), now the National Rally, has co-opted Joan’s image to suit their nationalist agenda. For them, Joan’s story is not about her gender or youth but her devotion to Catholicism and desire to expel foreign entities from France. Cappelle notes that, in France, Joan’s identity is more about her class than her gender. “We call her La Pucelle, ‘The Maid’, which is a specific reference to her status as a virgin. Because of this, I don’t think many people see her as a woman.” However, she explains that the far right omits Joan’s gender purposely: “It’s convenient for the far right to put aside her gender because they can discard all the things you assign to that gender – such as weakness, which they assign to womanhood.”
It’s convenient for the far right to put aside her gender because they can discard all the things you assign to that gender – such as weakness, which they assign to womanhood — Alice Cappelle
Marine Le Pen, who presides over the party as President, is frequently compared to the martyr, as their mission is believed to be one and the same: to cleanse and purify France (Joan of the English, and Le Pen of the North African immigrant population). As feminist theorist Demetra Demetriou writes, “Like Joan, Le Pen’s task of saving France acquires a Christic vocation that, however secularised, is genuinely spiritual and emotionally charged. In this respect, Marine Le Pen does not simply invoke Joan of Arc; she is Joan of Arc”.
Despite her short time on earth, Joan continues to have a long and complex afterlife. She has been everything: a proto-feminist, a rebellious teenager, a genderqueer martyr, a pious young woman, and, alarmingly, a symbol of far-right nationalism. Her legacy is complex and multifaceted, often viewed through a narrow lens – either feminist or fascist. However, as Demetriou importantly notes, we will never truly understand Joan’s thoughts or motivations. But we must confront her legacy in all its forms – the myths, facts, and political manipulations alike. Joan of Arc’s memory is as contested as it is enduring, proving that her story will continue to evolve with each generation. What will she be next? Only time will tell.
