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Summary
A French soldier instructs several sentinels to keep watch on the walls. Talbot enters with Bedford and Burgundy and other soldiers, equipped with ladders. Talbot says that they have chosen the best time to launch a surprise attack, for the French are weary from celebrating. The English lords split up and enter the city from three different directions. Talbot and his men scale the wall, and the sentinels sound the alarm.
Alençon and René emerge half dressed for battle, followed by Charles and Joan. Charles accuses Joan of treachery, and she chides him for unfairly expecting her to prevail while she’s sleeping. She says the blame is not hers but that of Charles’s watchmen, who quickly start accusing each other of forming the weak link in the fortifications. But Joan tells them to stop quarreling and repair the damage.
The next morning, Bedford and Talbot hear the French sounding the retreat. Talbot calls for the body of Salisbury to be brought into the city. Talbot intends to bury him in the center of Orléans so that everyone may link his death to the city’s sacking. A messenger then arrives to inform Talbot that the Countess of Auvergne summons him to her castle. She says she wants to behold such a famous warrior for herself. Burgundy thinks her request trivializes war and tells Talbot to ignore it. Talbot, however, accepts her invitation.
The Countess prepares for Talbot’s visit, remarking that if her plans come off, she will be famous. When Talbot arrives, the Countess wonders aloud if the physically unimpressive man she sees before her can be the same man so feared throughout France. Hearing her insults, he turns to leave. She calls him back, however, and when he confirms his identity, she announces that she has lured him to her home to imprison him for his trespasses against her countrymen. He laughs and exclaims that the individual before her is but the smallest part of “Talbot”; her castle could never contain the sum of his parts. He then blows on his trumpet, and when several English soldiers spill into her house, he explains that these men are the substance and arms of the Talbot who so terrifies France. The Countess asks his forgiveness, and he grants it in return for a meal.
Analysis
When Talbot manages to come back from defeat and gain another victory over the French, Charles immediately grows suspicious of Joan. We have already seen hints of his mercurial personality, which has proven distressing for his closest supporters. In particular, his noblemen have seemed peeved that Charles would so quickly and thoroughly grant power to this mystifying and mysteriously powerful woman. When Charles praised her to the skies for her victory at the end of act 1, he hailed her as the patron saint of France. Now, though, his tune has changed, and all because of one defeat. His sudden changes in attitude show that he is a somewhat immature figure, unable to see that no one person can be held responsible for the tides of war. Joan indicates as much when she chides the French king for his unfair expectations and points out that the fault must lie with those who were supposed to be guarding the city. In other words, the army must work together to ensure victory.
This idea is, incidentally, the key point made by Talbot when he bests the Countess of Auvergne by anticipating her ploy to imprison him. This scene is entirely of Shakespeare’s own imagining, and it seems that he may be offering the Countess as a weak counterpoint to the stalwart Joan. The Countess imagines that if she can best England’s greatest hero, then she will be celebrated as though she were like Tomyris, the fierce queen of Scythia who slew the warrior Cyrus in battle. But though she wishes for a glory comparable to Joan’s, the Countess has woefully underestimated Talbot, viewing his greatness as the possession of a single man. Yet when Talbot easily thwarts her plot, he emphasizes that a man like him achieves greatness in war not on his own, but through the collective action of the army of which he is but one part. Talbot may well be seen as the man who stands symbolically for the army as a whole, but in truth, it’s the other soldiers who constitute the greatness of the legend known as “Talbot.”
In making this point so elegantly and bloodlessly, Talbot demonstrates his commitment to ideals of honor and unity. Yet it’s also the case that Talbot’s methods of military leadership are the last remnants of an outmoded, feudal chivalry. Even in Henry V’s court, the king claimed his brotherhood with even the lowliest soldier. But increasingly, the nobles have begun to hold themselves above their soldiers, and class-based hierarchy gained a strong influence. Talbot alone, a hero of an earlier time, still maintains a meaningful relationship with his soldiers, who will fight to the death for him, and vice versa. But in Shakespeare’s world, those who are remainders of an earlier day, no matter how honorable and brave, will be left behind; they cannot survive. Given all the political infighting and immature squabbling among the English leadership, it seems a matter of time before Talbot falls. As noblemen seek power at the expense of the kingdom, the kingdom itself is doomed to decline. And as we’ve already seen with Salisbury, who died soon after his mortal wounding on the tower wall, the kingdom’s most steadfast flagbearers will be the first to go.
