Visions of the Maid


Book Description

Representations of Joan of Arc have been used in the United States for the past two hundred years, appearing in advertising, cartoons, popular song, art, criticism, and propaganda. The presence of the fifteenth-century French heroine in the cinema is particularly intriguing in relation to the role of women during wartime. Robin Blaetz argues that a mythic Joan of Arc was used during the First World War to cast a medieval glow over an unpopular war, but that she only appeared after the Second World War to encourage women to abandon their wartime jobs and return to the home. In Visions of the Maid, Blaetz examines three pivotal films Cecil B. DeMille's 1916 Joan the Woman, Victor Fleming's 1948 Joan of Arc, and Otto Preminger's 1957 Saint Joan as well as addressing a broad array of popular culture references and every other film about the heroine made or distributed in the United States. Blaetz is particularly concerned with issues of gender and the ways in which Joan of Arc's androgyny, virginity, and sacrificial victimhood were evoked in relation to the evolving roles of women during war throughout the twentieth century."




The Maid


Book Description

The girl who led an army. The peasant who crowned a king. The maid who became a legend.




Maids


Book Description

The scandalous true crime story about the Papin Sisters, as told by one of comics' most stylized talents. Christine Papin, an overworked live-in maid, is reunited with her younger sister, Lea, who has also been hired by the wealthy Lancelin family. They make the estate's beds, scrub the floors, and spy on the domestic strife that routinely occurs within its walls. What starts as petty theft by the maids ― who are flashing back to their tumultuous time in a convent ― shortly turns into something more nefarious. Madame Lancelin’s increasingly unhinged abuse ignites the sisters' toxic upbringing and social class exploitation and explodes into a ghastly double murder, an event that shocked and fascinated 1930s France and beyond. Maids has high bravura and high intrigue, all drawn in Skelly’s highly stylized manner, which combines the best of pop art, manga, and Eurocomics.




The Maid Narratives


Book Description

The Maid Narratives shares the memories of black domestic workers and the white families they served, uncovering the often intimate relationships between maid and mistress. Based on interviews with over fifty people -- both white and black -- these stories deliver a personal and powerful message about resilience and resistance in the face of oppression in the Jim Crow South. The housekeepers, caretakers, sharecroppers, and cooks who share their experiences in The Maid Narratives ultimately moved away during the Great Migration. Their perspectives as servants who left for better opportunities outside of the South offer an original telling of physical and psychological survival in a racially oppressive caste system: Vinella Byrd, for instance, from Pine Bluff, Arkansas, recalls how a farmer she worked for would not allow her to clean her hands in the family's wash pan. These narratives are complemented by the voices of white women, such as Flora Templeton Stuart, from New Orleans, who remembers her maid fondly but realizes that she knew little about her life. Like Stuart, many of the white narrators remain troubled by the racial norms of the time. Viewed as a whole, the book presents varied, rich, and detailed accounts, often tragic, and sometimes humorous. The Maid Narratives reveals, across racial lines, shared hardships, strong emotional ties, and inspiring strength.




The Maid and the Queen


Book Description

“Attention, ‘Game of Thrones’ fans: The most enjoyably sensational aspects of medieval politics—double-crosses, ambushes, bizarre personal obsessions, lunacy and naked self-interest—are in abundant evidence in Nancy Goldstone's The Maid and the Queen.” (Laura Miller, Salon.com) Politically astute, ambitious, and beautiful, Yolande of Aragon, queen of Sicily, was one of the most powerful women of the Middle Ages. Caught in the complex dynastic battle of the Hundred Years War, Yolande championed the dauphin's cause against the forces of England and Burgundy, drawing on her savvy, her statecraft, and her intimate network of spies. But the enemy seemed invincible. Just as French hopes dimmed, an astonishingly courageous young woman named Joan of Arc arrived from the farthest recesses of the kingdom, claiming she carried a divine message-a message that would change the course of history and ultimately lead to the coronation of Charles VII and the triumph of France. Now, on the six hundredth anniversary of the birth of Joan of Arc, this fascinating book explores the relationship between these two remarkable women, and deepens our understanding of this dramatic period in history. How did an illiterate peasant girl gain access to the future king of France, earn his trust, and ultimately lead his forces into battle? Was it only the hand of God that moved Joan of Arc-or was it also Yolande of Aragon?




Kateri Tekakwitha


Book Description

This is the inspiring story of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, a holy young Indian woman who was converted to Christianity by French missionaries during the 1600s. Ostracized from the Iroquois who had adopted her, Kateri lived as a single woman with deep faith, offering her sufferings and life to Christ. Affectionately known as "Lily of the Mohawks", she was recently beautified by Pope John Paul II. Illustrated.




The Maid of Orleans


Book Description

This acclaimed work on the life and mysticism of Joan of Arc is considered by historians as one of the most convincing, well researched and best written accounts of the Maid of Orleans. Stolpe vividly creates the contemporary situation in France during Joan's time, evaluates the latest research on her life, and arrives at an original and authentic portrait - one that is also a work of literature. Stolpe sees Joan of Arc as primarily a mystic, and her supreme achievement and lasting significance not so much in a mission to deliver France - though important - but in her sharing in the Passion of Christ. By shifting the emphasis from the national to the universal, Stolpe brings the saint closer to the modern reader. His scholarship is informed by a profound understanding and sympathy for the Maid, giving his essentially sober work the absorbing interest of a novel. As one critic stated, "Stolpe succeeds in producing a very tense interest, so that it is impossible to lay it aside until the last word is reached." This work should do much to present a new evaluation and appreciation of the life and mysticism of St. Joan of Arc, the Maid of Orleans.




Maid of Wonder


Book Description

Sophia must master her psychic ability if she is to save the life of Queen Elizabeth and her fellow maids from a dark prophecy, in this third book in the Maids of Honor series. Sophia Dee, the most unusual spy in Queen Elizabeth’s Maids of Honor, has run out of time for her psychic skills to fully manifest. A terrible prophecy haunts Windsor Castle, and the Queen demands answers before the next doomed soul dies. Thrust into a dangerous competition to solve the deadly prediction, Sophia finds herself pitted against the most celebrated mystics of Europe: John Dee, her devious uncle and the Queen’s personal astrologer, and Nostradamus, the renowned prophet-seer of France. In a court where whispers of witchcraft, poisonous plots, and grim assassins threaten her at every turn, Sophia needs answers fast. But does she dare trust Marcus Quinn, her uncle’s striking assistant? Or should she turn to the tortured dark angel of the spirit realm, who whispers to her only of danger and death? As new dangers surface and the prophecy sweeps toward its final victim, the five Maids of Honor prepare to do battle. Only then will the girl who so often sees the future finally discover if she can save the Crown—and herself.




Maid Marian


Book Description

An irresistible reimagining of the Robin Hood legend, Maid Marian brings to life the rollicking--and romantic--world of the Middle Ages. An orphan and heiress to a large country estate, Marian Fitzwater is wed at the age of five to an equally young nobleman, Lord Hugh of Sencaster, a union that joins her inheritance to his, vastly enriching his family. But when she is seventeen, Lord Hugh, whom she hasn't seen in years, dies under mysterious circumstances, leaving her alone again--a widow who has never been a bride. Like all unmarried young ladies of fortune, she is made a ward of Richard the Lionheart, England's warrior king. With King Richard away on Crusade, Marian's fate lies in the hands of his mother, the formidable Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, who will arrange her second marriage. The lucky bridegroom will get Marian's lands and, in return, pledge his loyalty--and silver--to King Richard. Marian herself is irrelevant and she knows it. Determined not to be sold into another sham marriage, she seeks out the one man whose spies can help uncover the queen's plans--Robin Hood, the notorious Saxon outlaw of Sherwood Forest. Marian is surprised to discover that the famed "prince of thieves" is not only helpful but handsome, likable and sympathetic to her plight. Following her plan, Robin’s men intercept a letter from Queen Eleanor, from which Marian learns, to her horror, that she is to marry her late husband’s brother. His family's history of mysterious deaths, puts Marian in grave danger. Once married, her land becomes theirs and they can easily dispose of her--a fate she may have only narrowly escaped already. On the eve of her wedding, Robin Hood spirits Marian back to the forest. Queen Eleanor believes her to be dead, allowing Marian to begin a new life with Robin Hood's outlaws, who pledge to help her regain her fortune and expose the treachery of her enemies.