The “Shavian Pattern” of Hallucinatory Experience: Saint Joan and the Problem of the Voices

Abstract

ABSTRACT The centennials of Joan of Arc’s canonization (1920) and Shaw’s Saint Joan (1923) afford an opportunity to revisit the play’s preface and its heroine to evaluate Shaw’s assessment of Joan’s enigmatic voice hearing against recent empirical research. The article summarizes Shaw’s position, situates it within the history of the psychiatry of voice hearing, and analyzes it in light of contemporary research on voice hearing generally and within religious communities. It argues that Shaw anticipated a late twentieth-century turn towards a benevolent regard for voice hearing and that he suggests venues for further research in areas still under-explored.