''Blood Red, Sister Rose'' (1974) is a novel by Australian writer
Thomas Keneally
Thomas Michael Keneally, AO (born 7 October 1935) is an Australian novelist, playwright, essayist, and actor. He is best known for his non-fiction novel ''Schindler's Ark'', the story of Oskar Schindler's rescue of Jews during the Holocaust, wh ...
.
Story outline
The novel explores the imagined psychology of
Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc (french: link=yes, Jeanne d'Arc, translit= an daʁk} ; 1412 – 30 May 1431) is a patron saint of France, honored as a defender of the French nation for her role in the siege of Orléans and her insistence on the coronati ...
, and tells her story from
Domrémy to the coronation of
Charles VII of France
Charles VII (22 February 1403 – 22 July 1461), called the Victorious (french: le Victorieux) or the Well-Served (), was King of France from 1422 to his death in 1461.
In the midst of the Hundred Years' War, Charles VII inherited the throne of F ...
in
Rheims. Significant secondary characters include Charles and
Gilles de Rais
Gilles de Rais (c. 1405 – 26 October 1440), Baron de Rais (), was a knight and lord from Brittany, Anjou and Poitou, a leader in the French army, and a companion-in-arms of Joan of Arc. He is best known for his reputation and later convi ...
. The novel enters into the minds of Joan and Charles but not of Gilles. A notable feature of the book is the conversations of Joan with her voices.
Critical reception
Kirkus Reviews noted about the novel: "This is probably Keneally's magnum opus, but like other culminating masterpieces its fictional components have been foreshadowed in his earlier, more modest novels. Again Keneally examines the predicament of the wise fools of this world, the forthright blunderers who, unlike the Establishment, take account of the realities of human suffering and cosmic bewilderment."
Veronica Brady, in her essay reviewing a number of Keneally novels noted that the author's Joan is "an Australian version of the French heroine, and her predicament reflects a tension central to a culture in which relationships to history on the one hand and to the environment on the other remain ambivalent."
["The Most Frightening Rebellion: The Recent Novels of Thomas Keneally" by Veronica Brady, ''Meanjin'', Vol 38 No. 1, April 1979]
See also
*
1974 in Australian literature
Notes
* Dedication: To my dear daughters Margaret and Jane.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Blood Red Sister Rose
Novels by Thomas Keneally
1974 Australian novels
Cultural depictions of Gilles de Rais
Cultural depictions of Joan of Arc