THE SUN – LE SOLEIL

The preceding Arcanum—"The Moon"—confronted us with the task of human intelligence to liberate itself from the magical enchantment which separates it from spontaneous wisdom, and to unite itself with the latter, i.e. to arrive at intuition. The nineteenth Arcanum—"The Sun"— is that of the accomplished union of intelligence and spontaneous wisdom: the Arcanum of intuition.

Intuition is what results from the intimate and profound alliance of intelligence and spontaneous wisdom. Now, the Card of the nineteenth Arcanum represents two children placed under the sun, where the one puts his right hand on the neck of the other as if he wanted to draw his head near to himself, whilst the other touches with his left hand the place on the body of the first where his heart is to be found. [...] One could hardly better represent the relationship of intelligence and spontaneous wisdom brought into play in intuition than as it is in the Card of the Arcanum "The Sun". For this relationship presupposes such purity of intention as is found only with a child, and it postulates such reciprocal confidence, without a shadow of doubt or suspicion, which belongs naturally to children. Lastly, this relationship excludes tendencies to domination and authority — to pose as a pontiff and to pride oneself on the eminence of the guru or master whose favours one enjoys[...].

"The children who are fraternising under the sun correspond all the better to Gemini because this zodiacal constellation brings in the longest days to us"—says Oswald Wirth (Le Tarot des imagiers du moyen age, Paris, 1927. p. 208), thus locating the nineteenth Arcanum in the zodiacal circle of twelve cosmic mysteries [...].

Now, the teaching-impulse called "Gemini" can be expressed by paraphrasing a little the first statement of the Emerald Table of Hermes:

May that which is below be as that which is above, and
may that which is above be as that which is below
to accomplish the miracles of one thing.

This is the principle of analogy put into practice, taking its point of departure from the principle of cooperation. It is the opposite of that of the struggle for existence advanced by Charles Darwin as the principle of evolution called "Sagittarius". Nature furnishes us at the same time with a great number of proofs of the principle of cooperation in the process of evolution —perhaps as many proofs as there are of the struggle for existence. The proofs are of a kind such that one could uphold the principle of cooperation to be worthy as the directing principle of natural evolution with the same justification as the principle of struggle may be upheld.[...]

Bees and flowering plants cooperate. Air, light and plants cooperate in photosynthesis, where the miracle of the transformation of inorganic matter into organic matter takes place—where "stones" are transformed into "bread". And, lastly, if mankind had not cooperated more than it had struggled, it would not only not have achieved the international civilisation of our time but it would probably have been annihilated.

There is therefore no doubt that the principle of cooperation has at least the same rights to be considered as the directing principle of evolution as that of the struggle for existence advanced by Darwinism. In other words, the diurnal principle of Gemini plays a role at least equal to the nocturnal principle of Sagittarius in natural evolution.

One of the highest aspects of the principle of Gemini, the principle of cooperation, is that which is present in intuition: that of the cooperation between spontaneous wisdom and intelligence. Here it is a matter of a state of consciousness where intelligence advances from formal knowledge to material knowledge, i.e. from knowledge of the relationships of things to knowledge of the things themselves. Now, the "knowledge of things themselves" entails two functions: on the one hand what Henri Bergson happily designates as "sympathy", and on the other hand a sustained and profound deepening in that with which the sympathetic relationship is established. [...] Here is a concrete example:

You venerate (i.e. you love and respect) a non-incarnated being —a departed person, a saint, or a hierarchical being—in a disinterested manner. Your veneration —which includes love, respect, gratitude, the desire to conform, etc.—cannot fail to create an invisible link of sympathy with its object.[...]

The meeting is thus the realisation of the relationship when it is borne to the limit of the intensity of clarity. According to the case, it can take either the character of a "conversation through forces" or that of a "conversation through words". In the former case it is not precise and articulated thoughts or images which are communicated to you, but rather "forces" or impulses —spiritual and psychic seeds impregnated germinally with moral ideas and judgements. In the case of the "conversation through words" a revelation of articulated thoughts and representations takes place. [...]

Now, the meeting whose character is "conversation through forces" always resembles the experience of the "star" of the mages from the East, and that whose character is "conversation through words" always resembles the experience of the shepherds of Bethlehem. The "star" does not speak, it moves; and it leaves to the subject of its revelation the work of research in the domain of intelligence and facts. The meeting whose character is "conversation through words", in contrast, moves and teaches — it bears also on the domain of intelligence and facts. It guides. [...]

With respect to the nineteenth Arcanum of the Tarot, we find it again in the work of Jung in the guise of the active cooperation of intelligence and transcendental revelatory being, which cooperation is not only the mature fruit of the work of his long life, but also it is the principal thesis of his method of work in the domain of depth psychology, which he openly advanced and maintained. The intuition postulated by Henri Bergson as necessary in order to be able to understand life and the world was practised by Jung in order to understand and to heal the life of the human soul. He did not commit the error of the mages of the Orient. He did not consult Herod and his people. [...]

In writing of the force of soul resulting from faithfulness to the "star"— the force which manifests itself in the power to resist the weakness of revolt (for revolt is a weakness where one lets oneself be carried away by the current of emotional impatience — the fundamental weakness of all rebels, including religious reformers as well as political revolutionaries and the most celebrated social reformers) and in the power to procure peace between two aspirations which are, or are believed to be, opposed to one another —it is difficult for me not to pay homage to two Hermeticists of our century, notably Francis Warrain and Dr. Paul Carton, both avowed Hermeticists.[...]

Intuition is therefore the cooperation of human intelligence with superhuman wisdom. It is what creates the link—or the "intermediary gnosis" and "intermediary magic"— between the absolute and the relative, between the supernatural and the natural, between faith and reason. Now, intuition can be developed only by people who have faith and who have reason. It is reserved for believing thinkers. Whosoever believes and does not think will never attain it. Whosoever thinks and does not believe will never have the certainty of transcendental things that intuition alone can give.

Intuition combines two certainties: essential certainty (that of essence), and consistent certainty (that of consistency). The former is of a moral order; its force of conviction resides in the good and the beautiful. The latter is of a cognitive order; its force of conviction resides in consistency in the vision of the relationships of things. Intuitive certainty is therefore "faith at first hand" combined with "intelligence at first hand".[...]

Now, it is postulative faith become faith at first hand (mysticism) which arrives at the perfect certainty of intuition as a consequence of the help of intelligence. John the Baptist still had need of this latter in order to have complete certainty. For this reason he —who had seen the Spirit descend upon Jesus —sent two disciples to Jesus to ask him, "Are you he who is to come, or shall we look for another?" (Matthew xi, 3). And Jesus had to reply in the framework of intelligence alone: "Go and tell John what you hear and see" [...]

This is the briefest and most complete characteristic of intelligence and its role. Its role is immense, if one considers that intelligence is called to constitute an integral part of intuition [...].

This role was understood in the Middle Ages in the ecclesiastical milieu of the West. [...W]hat is at the root of scholasticism is the desire for the fullness of intuition, i.e. that of "baptising" intelligence and winning its cooperation with faith. [...]

Dear Unknown Friend, do not scorn mediaeval scholasticism. It is, in truth, as beautiful, as venerable and as inspiring as the great cathedrals that we have inherited from the Middle Ages. To it we owe a number of masterpieces of thought—thought in the light of faith. And, like all true masterpieces, those of mediaeval scholasticism are beneficial. They heal the disorientated, feverous and confused soul. [... I]t is this elevation above psychological complexes which is the salutary effect —even the healing action —of occupation with scholasticism, when one reads in the style of scholastic meditation.

[...] Why not mathematics? Doesn’t mathematics have the same effect of detachment and elevation above personal psychological limitations?

Without doubt mathematics also has a salutary effect. But it does not so engage the whole human being as does the totality of scholastic problems, and consequently its salutary effect does not have the same significance. What is at stake with scholasticism is God, the soul, freedom, immortality, salvation, good and evil. The triumph over psychological factors here is something quite different than triumph over the same psychological factors through occupying oneself with quantities and their functions alone.[...]

No more is it true that the mystical impulse from the end of the thirteenth and into the seventeenth century was purely and simply a reaction against the "dry intellectualism" of scholasticism. No, the flowering of mysticism during this epoch was the fruit and the result of scholasticism, prefigured in the spiritual biography of St. Thomas Aquinas himself. Notably, St. Thomas towards the end of his life arrived at mystical contemplation of God and the spiritual world and said, on returning from this ecstasy, that his written works now appeared ro him "like straw". Indeed, he wrote nothing after this.

The believing thinker thus became a seeing mystic. And this transformation did not take place in spite of his work of scholastic thought, but rather thanks to it —as its fruit and its crowning glory.

[...] Now, it is the nineteenth Arcanum of the Tarot which invites us to occupy ourselves quite especially with the "star" of Hermeticism in the heaven of intuition. What is this "star"? The Zohar says:

And God made the two great lights. . .originally, when the moon and sun were in intimate union, they shone with equal luminosity. The names JEHOVAH and ELOHIM were then associated as equals.. .and the two lights were dignified with the same name: MAZPAZ MAZPAZ. . .The two lights rose simultaneously and were of the same dignity. But. . . the moon humbled herself by diminishing her light, and renounced her place of higher rank. From that time she has had no light of her own, but derives her light from the sun. [...I]t was only after diminishing herself that she took the name ELOHIM. But her power is manifest in all directions. . .EL being "the dominion of the day", IM being "the dominion of the night" and HE in the middle being the remainder of the forces ("the stars"), participating in both dominions. (Zohar Bereshith 20a)

It is left to us only to cite another passage from an ancient source —from the eleventh book of Apuleius’ Metamorphosis —in order to have all the elements necessary to grapple, sufficiently equipped, with the problem of the "star" of Hermeticism and "The Sun" of the nineteenth Arcanum of the Tarot. Apuleius summarised his great vigil at the temple of Isis — the "arcana of the sacred night" (noctis sacratae arcana) —in the following way:

I approached the very gates of death and set one foot on Proserpine’s threshold, yet was permitted to return, rapt through all the elements. At midnight I saw the sun shining in its brilliant radiance; I entered the presence of the gods of the under-world and the gods of the upper-world, stood near and worshipped them. (Apuleius, Transformations: The Golden Ass)

Let us now seek for the reality, having in view the above-cited passage from the Zohar and the statement made by Apuleius. The Zohar tells us that the moon "renounced her place of higher rank"—that of equality with the sun —and that "from that time she has had no light of her own, but derives her light from the sun; nevertheless, her real light is greater than that which she radiates here below". Here below, therefore, the moon reflects the light of the sun, whilst above — where her name is ELOHIM —"her power is manifest in all directions… EL being ‘the dominion of the day’, IM being ‘the dominion of the night’ and HE in the middle being the remainder of the forces (‘the stars’), participating in both dominions."

Now, the moon, in so far as she is the nocturnal luminary here below, reflects the sun, but in so far as she is the nocturnal luminary above, she shines with her own light, and it is the sun which reflects her. In other words, the moon is "solar" above and "lunar" here below, whilst the sun is "solar" here below and "lunar" above. It is in this sense that EL, the radiant part of the moon’s name above, has "the dominion of the day",i.e. it is the visible sun — reflecting the invisible moon during the day. Similarly, the visible moon reflects the sun (become invisible) during the night. The spiritual moon is therefore the sun which shines at midnight. And it is the spiritual moon — or Isis-Sophia — that Apuleius "saw shining at midnight in its brilliant radiance". For the long vigil in the Isis temple resulted in a vision of the cosmic principle of Isis, i.e. the spiritual moon or the "sun at midnight".

All these things, although presented to us in mythological clothing, relate to the profound reality of the relationship of intelligence and wisdom, and their union —intuition. For intelligence corresponds to the moon, wisdom to the sun, and intuition to the restoration of the "intimate union" of the two luminaries. [...] "The Sun" of the nineteenth Arcanum is the "sun at midnight", i.e. the "sun" that Apuleius "saw shining at midnight in its brilliant radiance", and it is this "sun" which is the "star" of Hermeticism across the ages. It is the principle of intuition, or the intimate union of transcendental intelligence and wisdom.

The Arcanum of intuition is therefore that of knowing how to raise to creative intelligence the intelligence which reflects, and how to effect its union with wisdom, i.e. that of the work of re-establishing, firstly, the union of intelligence of diminished light here below with the intelligence of complete light above, and then the union of intelligence-thus-reunited with divine wisdom (see figure).[...]

Just as the impulse of scholasticism, on the historical ladder of western civilisation, did not lead to a perfect system of scholastic philosophy, but rather to mysticism, so does individual intelligence, on the ladder of individual development, lead to intuition and not to a state where it knows all and explains all. Intelligence is not the absolute aim; in developing, it is transformed into intuition. It is called to effect the passage from argumentative reasoning to comprehensive intuition. [...]

The Zohar and Apuleius speak of the moon and the sun joined —the sign which is the sign of Isis. We find this sign again in the apocalyptic vision of the woman enveloped by the sun and with the moon under her feet. But the apocalyptic vision adds here a third element: the twelve stars.

In other words, intelligence united to wisdom in intuition still does not signify the achievement of the work of the reintegration of consciousness, if it is not crowned by a third element, which corresponds to the "stars" just as intelligence corresponds to the "moon" and wisdom to the "sun". What, therefore, is this third element?

In order to understand its role and nature it is still necessary for us to look at — and this time more closely — the experience of spirits who turned from intellectualism to intuitionism. [...It is] the German philosopher [...] Schopenhauer [...] author of the celebrated book The World as Will and Representation, who made the decisive step from Kant’s thesis (that phenomena hide the essence of things, and that the essence remains inaccessible to intelligence as such) to the intuitive introspection of the essence of one thing —the Self—a thing that represents and contains the other things of the world.

This intuitive introspection allowed him to arrive at the conclusion that it is the will which is the essence of things, and that things are only representations of the will. Therefore the world is, according to Schopenhauer, a unique will which represents or "imagines" the multiplicity of things. And as Schopenhauer found that the same experience gave rise to almost the same conclusion in Indian mystical philosophy—above all in the Vedanta, based on the Upanishads of the Vedas — he said: "The Upanishads were my consolation in life, and they will also be so in death".

Thus, the mystical philosophy of India is the original and prototype of intuitionist philosophies of the West —such as that of Schopenhauer, Deussen and Eduard von Hartmann [...]. Let us therefore examine the fundamental experience and principal conclusion to be drawn from the mystical philosophy of India, as represented by the Vedanta of the Advaita ("non-dualist") school.

This philosophy is founded on intuitive-introspection -as method. This is based on the one hand on experience of the will as the element underlying all intellectual, psychological, biological and mechanical movement, and on the other hand on the experience of the "inner eye" or detached transcendental Self, which observes the movements produced by the will. The will creates the multiplicity of mental, psychic, biological and mechanical phenomena, in contrast to the unity of "the Seer in seeing" (the transcendental Self). The transcendental Self does not move, therefore it does not change, therefore it is immortal, therefore it is not an entity separated from the real essence of the world, and thus it is one with it. The true Self of man and the essence of the real world— or God— are identical. Aham Brahma asmi ("I am Brahma") —this is the formula which gives a summary of the experience and conclusions drawn by the Vedanta.

Now, it suffices on the one hand not to identify with the will and its movements and on the other hand to identify with the transcendental Self—"the Seer in seeing"— in order to attain to the real being and essence of the world in the intuitive experience of Vedanta adherents and German intuitionist philosophers. But one could ask: Is the intuitive experience of the transcendental Self truly final and complete, so that nothing follows it or surpasses it? Is the experience of the transcendental Self truly the nec plus ultra ("the ultimate") of knowledge?

Indeed, it lacks something important: the whole spiritual world, i.e. the Holy Trinity and the nine spiritual hierarchies. The "great portent" of which the Apocalypse speaks indicates beyond the sun and moon a crown of twelve stars on the head of the woman.

The intuitive experience of the transcendental Self—sublime and stimulating as it may be —does not suffice, alone, to let us perceive, and to render us conscious of, the spiritual world. The union of the "moon" and the "sun" alone, in the human spiritual microcosm, still does not signify the experience of the spiritual macrocosm. It is not sufficient to elevate oneself to the transcendental Self; it is necessary, still further, that this transcendental Self perceives and becomes conscious of other "transcendental Selves"—many of which are higher than it. The transcendental Self of man, as eternal and immutable as it is, is not the ultimate summit in world evolution.

[..] Judaeo-Christian Hermeticism, which ranges itself on the side of Sankya with respect to the negation of the identification of the "transcendental Self with God, is intensely occupied with the third "luminary"—the "stars"—in the three aspects of astrology, angelology and trinitarian theology, which aspects correspond to the body, soul and spirit of the third "luminary". Judaeo-Christian Hermeticism is thus the sustained effort across the centuries to know and understand the three luminaries in their unity, i.e. to know and understand the "great portent which appeared in heaven — a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars" (Revelation xii, 1). It is the woman in this apocalyptic vision who unites the three "luminaries"— the moon, the sun and the stars, i.e. the luminaries of night, day and eternity.

It is she —the "Virgin of light" of the Pistis Sophia, the Wisdom sung of by Solomon, the Shekinah of the Cabbala, the Mother, the Virgin, the pure celestial Mary—who is the soul of the light of the three luminaries, and who is both the source and aim of Hermeticism. For Hermeticism is, as a whole, the aspiration to participation in knowledge of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and the Mother, Daughter and Holy Soul. It is not a matter of seeing the Holy Trinity with human eyes, but rather of seeing with the eyes —and in the light —of Mary-Sophia.[...]

The Athenians, also, had an analogous feminine triad, which played the principal role in the mysteries of Eleusis: Demeter—the Mother, Persephone —the Daughter, and "Athena the bringer of salvation" (cf. Olympiodorus, In Platonis Phaedonem commentaria = "Commentary on the Phaedo of Plato"; ed. W. Norvin, Leipzig, 1913, p. Ill)—where Athena was at the same time the "community of Athens" or the "soul of Athens" as it were, analogous to the "Virgin of Israel".

Historical analogies and metaphysical parallels alone, however, do not suffice to attain the complete certainty of intuition: it is for the heart to say the last decisive word. Thus the following "argument of the heart" proved to be decisive, twenty-five years ago, to the one who writes these lines.

There is nothing which is more necessary and more precious in the experience of human childhood than parental love; nothing more necessary, because the human child, alone, is not viable if it is not taken from the first moments of its life into the circle of care of parental love or, lacking parental love, its substitute-charity; nothing more precious, because the parental love experienced in childhood is moral capital for the whole of life. In childhood we receive two dowries for life, two assets from which we can draw during the whole of life: the vital biological asset which is the treasure of our health and vital energy, and the moral asset which is the treasure of health of soul and its vital energy—its capacity to love, to hope and to believe. The moral asset is the experience of parental love that we have had in childhood. It is so precious, this experience, that it renders us capable of elevating ourselves to more sublime things —even to divine things.[...] For it is the experience of parental love —and it is above all this —which renders us capable of loving the "Architect" or "First Cause" of the world as our Father who is in heaven. Parental love bears in itself true senses of the soul for the Divine —which are, by analogy, eyes and ears of the soul.

Now, the experience of parental love consists of two elements: the experience of maternal love and that of paternal love. The one and the other are equally necessary and equally precious. The one and the other render us capable of raising ourselves to the Divine. The one and the other signify to us the means of entering into a living relationship with God, which means to love God, who is the prototype of all paternity and all maternity. [...]

Similarly, it is so with the rosary prayer, where appeal to the two aspects of divine paternal love in the prayer addressed to the Father and the Mother is made during meditation on the mysteries of the Joy, Suffering and Glory of the Blessed Virgin. The rosary prayer is — in any case for the Hermeticist — again a masterpiece of simplicity, containing and revealing things of inexhaustible profundity. . a masterpiece of the Holy Spirit!

Dear Unknown Friend, the Arcanum "The Sun" with which we are occupied is an Arcanum of children bathing in the light of the sun. Here it is not a matter of finding occult things, but rather of seeing ordinary and simple things in the light of day of the sun —and with the look of a child.

The nineteenth Arcanum of the Tarot, the Arcanum of intuition, is that of revelatory naivety in the act of knowledge, which renders the spirit capable of an intensity of look not troubled by doubt and by the scruples engendered by doubt, i.e. it is the vision of things such as they are under the eternally new day of the sun. It teaches the art of undergoing the pure and simple impression which reveals through itself—without intellectual hypotheses and superstructures —what things are. To render impressions noumenous— this is what it is a matter of in the Arcanum "The Sun", the Arcanum of intuition.

You will understand therefore, dear Unknown Friend, that in speaking of parental love and of its two aspects, in speaking of the practice of the novena and the rosary prayer, etc., we are in no way estranging ourselves from the theme of the nineteenth Arcanum of the Tarot; rather, on the contrary, we are penetrating to its very heart. For we are endeavouring to advance from an understanding of what intuition is to its exercise, i.e. from meditation on the Arcanum of intuition to the use of this Arcanum.

It was the English Romantics in the early 19th century who first expressed the idea that poetry, and the proces of its making, was in some ways a sacred art. In Defence of Poetry Shelley gave poets the status of ‘unacknowledged legislators of the world‘. For me, that sums up the mysterious, esoteric nature of creating poetry, an alchemical combination of language, rhythm, and rhyme, that, if succesful, transforms both the poet’s and reader‘s view of some essential aspect of life. It is both a liberating and revelatory art – even so-called light verse, or comic poetry can achieve this. Whilst this is a high claim for an art that is not highly valued at the present time (and wasn’t even in Shelley’s time – hence the need for a ‘defence‘), I believe it to be a fundamental, a priori aspect of any attempt to make poetry: it is a task analogous with finding and giving meaning to the world.

In the same century as the English Romantics, the Tarot was first seen as a vehicle of perennial esoteric wisdom and truth. The images of the Tarot are now also understood by many to be not merely divinatory aids, nor merely symbols of ancient and universal wisdom, but active agents of spiritual realities. In particular, the major arcana or trumps are thought of in this way.

The above ideas on poetry and the Tarot are the inspiration for a writing project that has kept my mind active and alight during a current period of long service leave. Whereas previously, like the critic Hazlitt said of Wordsworth, ‘he is his own subject‘, I have set myself a poetical subject that is, at first blush‚ outside of myself: the 22 major arcana. So far, I have written drafts of 13 poems on 13 of the cards. I have found the process an intriguing and rewarding one, firstly in regards to the way the Tarot images – seemingly static images in space – give rise to not only the fundamental language of the poems, but their voice, form and rhythm, things that belong to an unfolding of meaning in time.

There have been at least two principles that I have felt I must adhere to in the creation of the poems (which are, by the way, based on the images from Marseille type decks – more on this choice later). The first follows from what is said in the above paragraph about the relationship of the Tarot to poetry: that the Tarot images belong, in some way, to an imaginative realm that is eternal and that expresses something timeless and universal about human experience. This idea came to me from reading the wonderful Meditations on the Tarot, where the anonymous author, a deeply Christian man, apologises for being enthusiastic about images and confesses to being a Hermeticist. And following from this, secondly: that at least some of the imagery of the poems must be taken directly from the card itself, so that faithful observation is a key to the emergence of meaning in all its forms in the poems. This is not to say that every detail of the cards is mentioned directly or literally in the poem, nor that the only imagery in the poem is that of the card. On the contrary, what I have found, in being open to each image, is that the cards have inspired the invention of a diverse range of voices, personas, forms, situations and subjects. Humour has manifested itself often – there is no doubt that sacred ideas and the satire of very human frailities sit side by side in the Marseille decks. Of course – and it seems obvious now – there is a great deal of interpretation in the poems, or I should say suggestion about what a card or aspects of a card may mean. However, poetry is not a dogmatic or even, really, a didactic tool. What seems to have flowed through are words and forms that are, like the Tarot images, pictures or imaginings of experience, articulated in the English language. These poetical suggestions of meaning are also, of course, peculiar to my own life experiences and particular poetic imagination and vocabulary – with all their limitations.

My use of the cards has therefore also made clear to me the way poetry, or at least my poetry making, is a mysterious search for the right word and phrase. It has been both liberating and sobering to have to find exactly the ‘right’ word. I feel I have had to be true to the cards, to their creator, and the figures and realities depicted. Whilst some of the poems so far have an irreverant or satirical aspect, I have felt a great need to not be trivial, mundane or arbitrary.

Finally, the process so far has been an incredibly personal one and, therefore, a confronting one, despite my initial feelings of writing about an ‘external’ subject. Composing poems on the Fool, the Magician, Death, the Devil, the Tower, the Star, the High Priestess, the Empress, the Pope, the Hermit, The Hanged Man and the Lover, has made me really look at these cards and that has necessarily lead to some uncovering of hidden depths in myself. Yet, the wonderful paradox of the sacred art that is the Marseille Tarot and the art of poetry, is that with the right language and form, the personal sounds and hopefully is universal – and timeless! At times, it has appeared all too clear to me that the cards are unfolding themselves everywhere at everytime. (Perhaps this is one of the benefits and reasons for having the leisure of long service leave!). Feeling very despondent and gloomy and then suddenly seeing Venus in the evening sky lead to a beginning for my poem on the Star; and a day in which I discovered my old home demolished, and a friend’s house in danger of catching on fire, made me think more deeply about the Tower. The Tarot has made me realise even more clearly how the literal and symbolic exist simultaneously in poetry and in life.

So, I am in the process of writing poetry inspired by the Tarot. Subjects like the Emperor (whom I am having trouble with), the Moon (what a poetical symbol!) Judgement and the World certainly make one humble and respectful; and yet a poet must be fresh and exuberant! My disclaimer in signing off is that these poems are not teaching or reading tools. They are free explorations, in poetical mode, of my personal imaginings on these incredible scared images. I have also gravitated to the Marseille for this reason, (among others), for the marseille type decks appear, to me, to leave the poetic imagination free to associate, dream and – despite their vintage – connect the Tarot to contemporary experience. I hope my efforts are smiled upon and forgiven.

XII (draft only!) A man is being hung by the foot! All the people gather round To gawk. He must be a criminal To suffer such ignominy In public. Hung between two trees In the square. At least he’s dressed well. He is only young – mislead youth No doubt. Well, serves Him right to challenge social mores In these times When there is a lot To fear and be Suspicious about. The free individual Really shouldn’t flaunt itself These days. Society is more important And has to make a public display Of vagrancy. It is a time for the established Ways and places and stations To be maintained – by force Or detainment if necessary. The hanging of feet Is an emblem of this need, This just practice of reminding – Like rotting heads on poles And children overboard And crosses on a hill – Of the fate of those who See things all the wrong way round. A man is hanging himself by the foot! He has mastered this act so well, He does it with his hands tied behind his back, And an expression of serenity. And so Ezekiel lay for days on each side, And Diogenes ate dung And rolled his barrel all day long Up and down the hill. One even thinks of Mr Spaceman Near the Bourke St Mall, Or the circus acrobat, Confounding the greatest of tyrants Through mid-air. The Romans also had their Silenus, The ugly, satyr fool Pissing up the front Whilst supremely divine within; Oh hanged man, you give me renewed hope That the dark days are gone Or can be dispersed with a will; Your choice of tying up your left Foot to the tree in the firmament Shows me, As I go on my way to lunchtime trivialities, Why I loved To hang from those football oval fences and monkey bars And see the world upside down; You remind me of the strange beauty Of the image in water, rippling in the breeze, And the familiar bush in moonlight; You remind me that The world is actually wrong. Shane W Kendal

> www.tarotpedia.com/wiki/Boiardo

Some time between circa 1460 – 1494, Count Matteo Maria Boiardo wrote a poem about cards, the structure of which either mimics or anticipates tarot: apart from the brief opening and closing sonets, the first four ‘chapters’ (of five) have fourteen parts, and the fifth twenty-two. This mirrors precisely tarot as we know it, with four suits of fourteen cards, and a fifth trump suit of twenty-two.

It is one of the oldest references to a deck with 22 trumps. From this some have suggested that perhaps Count Boiardo invented this structure which, on this argument, eventually became the standard structure for tarot.

Biography

Count Matteo Maria Boiardo of Scandiano was born in Scandiano circa 1440. In 1476 he moved to Ferrara as court poet of Ercole D’Este. In 1480 he was appointed Moden’s governor, and died in Reggio Emilia in 1494.

Decks

A deck, based on extant designs from the 15th and 16th centuries, has recently been produced by LoScarabeo using this poem.

Content

Content of the said chapters
by Matteo Maria Boiardo
about a new game of cards.

Four passions of the soul, milady,
Are forty cards in this game.
The lesser gives place to the worthier,
And their meaning gives them their suit.

Each suit also has four figures,
Each of which I place in due role,
With twenty and one triumphs; and in the meanest place
Is a fool, because the fool the world adores.

Love, hope, jealousy and fear
Are the passions, and the cards have a tercet
So as not to leave the player in error.

The number in the verses runs:
One, two, three, ending at the highest;
Now it remains for you to find the art of the game.

Fear

HERE BEGIN THE FIVE MOST
BEAUTIFUL CHAPTERS ON FEAR,
JEALOUSY, HOPE, AND LOVE, OF
COUNT MATTEO MARIA BOIARDO
FIRST CHAPTER – FEAR (Whips)

1) FEAR keeps a soul is such doubts
That it has little reason to live happily,
Because it never enjoys and is always afraid.

2) FEAR, where there is some danger, forbids
All pleasure, and makes a man so faint-hearted,
That reason can never appease the soul.

3) FEAR makes the lamb tremble in the fold
If it hears the wolf outside; and it stays so enclosed,
That the subtlest breeze can hardly reach it.

4) FEAR keeps four horses at the service of a chariot
Under a cane, tied to a yoke;
It also keeps many in servitude, whom I do not excuse.

5) FEAR so grips us sometimes, that we cannot
Express our feelings, which is a great damage,
Because respect is a fellow of fear.

6) FEAR makes so that someone never defends himself,
And in case of conflict chooses to implore
And surrenders without using his weapons.

7) FEAR: if you reach the armed men in a joust,
Their courage will be dead under your influence;
Whenever you are present, you can see it on their faces.

8 ) FEAR troubles the senses, and makes pale
the face; one feels his heart tremble because of it,
And the eye shows it with an oblique glance.

9) FEAR has no doubts, about what is
present: but even though it be far away, it fears
Danger, and to fear danger seems near.

10) FEAR is certainly vain when you imagine it,
And where fear reigns, everyone agrees
That that body is ill and not healthy.

11) FEAR transformed Phineas, a tower among men,
Into stone, by the face of Medusa;
But fortune does not help the timid.

12) FEAR once turned king Ptolemy
Against Pompey, merely because Ptolemy was afraid
That Caesar would have taken his kingdom away from him.

13) FEAR prevented Andromache from saving
Her son, seeing Ulysses: and made him enter
Into the same tomb as his father Hector.

14) FEAR: Dionysius, instead of a barber,
Had his own daughters shave him with coals, in order
To avoid iron; and in the end he did not avoid it.

Because it is difficult to avoid what has been decided by heaven.

Jealousy

SECOND CHAPTER ABOUT JEALOUSY (Eyes)

1) JEALOUSY cannot spoil a true love,
Because if a lover goes with pure faithfulness,
Love rewards him at the end of his service.

2) JEALOUSY is a hard thing, when it seeks
to be useful to the rival in love:
Because often imploring grants mercy.

3) JEALOUSY makes sad a merry heart,
But often its spurs are the reason
That brings a lover to virtuous honour.

4) JEALOUSY, when it comes, it is better not to think
That you can fight it, because it wins everyone:
But it is good to be able to tolerate it.

5) JEALOUSY is searched by everyone, then everyone
Wants to avoid it; before, everyone wants to know;
Then everyone wants to lack knowledge.

6) JEALOUSY must not always take the rival
As an enemy; on the contrary, if he
Wants to win, he must be patient.

7) If JEALOUSY takes to see the thing that you love
Next to your rival, you think
That he is always talking in your interest.

8 ) JEALOUSY is so bad where it strikes,
That there is no cure for it;
If it grows too much, it is lethal.

9) JEALOUSY is no less frequent among the Gods,
Then among people; look at Juno,
Jealous of her Jove in some guilty situations!

10) JEALOUSY never puts anyone on the road
to certainty, it does not open the doors of truth,
It keeps people between hope and doubt.

11) JEALOUSY never was sure of Argus and
Of his cunning eyes, until the footsteps
With the name of Io were given to it.

12) JEALOUSY induced king Turnus, who was the heir
of king Latinus, to start a lethal war:
And he was killed, because death proceeds of such things.

13) JEALOUSY made Juno come to earth many times
For various loves of Jove,
Because whoever has it in the heart can never rest.

14) JEALOUSY made Vulcan change his shape
And catch Venus and Mars in his own net,
And the Sun made the proofs be manifest,

With its eclipses, signs and comets.

Hope

THIRD CHAPTER ABOUT HOPE (Vases with cover)

1) HOPE sometimes keeps a body joint with
A soul, that would not live without it,
And in the end it always reaches the palm of victory.

2) HOPE has never been defeated by any doubt,
But it is solid and constant to the end,
When Reason arrives to help hope.

3) HOPE when is limited to a boundary,
If it wants to move further than should be done,
Founds thorns before it reaches the flower.

4) HOPE when it comes together with reason
Is the sweetest food for the heart that wears it;
If it comes in another way, it brings more suffering.

5) HOPE keeps us in games and festivity
When power is fighting against will;
But, without order, it contains bad things.

6) HOPE, you are a friend of nature!
You keep your followers in such peace,
That any suffering does not seem to be hard.

7) HOPE, if you are not there
When someone has his own, you put such doubts
That he will not dare to say it is mine.

8 ) HOPE gives by itself to the soul
That which the soul desires, and it seems
It already has it, and it finds no resitance.

9) HOPE does not allow to be sad to someone
who is caught in a cage, when it is with him,
Nor to a shipwrecked, even if he is on dry sand.

10) HOPE wakes up the poor man who works
Digging, making a mountain, or a lake, flat,
Because he hopes to receive a prize for his efforts.

11) HOPE transformed Horatius in a lion, a dragon
So that he had the bridge cut, and went down
Desiring the safety of his homeland.

12) HOPE brought Jason, of unstrained soul,
And the Argonauts to the golden fleece
Through many adventures and a dangerous travel.

13) HOPE led Judith
Out of Betulia, to put Oloferne to an end,
and it seemed it was nothing but a big hope.

14) HOPE drove Eneas out of the Trojan border
To Italy; and his successors founded
Alba and then Rome for the Latin people.

Who once were the rulers of the world.

Love

FOURTH CHAPTER ON LOVE

1) LOVE, if someone wants to be in good relations with you,
He has to be ready, courageous and prompt,
For, in the end, who holds on wins the prize.

2) LOVE, there is no doubt that jealousy
Is always with you many places:
But if it is little, it’s good, too much is bad.

3) LOVE, the end and final goal of your earnings
Is a continuous sighing until you die;
And he who laughs one day, cries thereafter for an year.

4) LOVE, this desire holds so strong
Of aquiring what you impress in one’s heart,
That it seems that doors do not open for your aim.

5) LOVE teaches to us not to be afraid
In every deed: because a courageous
Is always a winner in courtship.

6) LOVE, if sometimes you wound an heart,
And heal it with that same arrow,
How much it is favoured in your kingdom!

7) LOVE made that wise king go
As an animal for seven years: because its law
Makes the prince equal to his own servant.

8 ) LOVE made so that Apollon looked after
The herd of Admetus, and in the end it was not
Cruel to him; it corrects its people in such ways.

9) LOVE finds new arts; and under its honey
It always keeps a bait; and it makes its servants happy,
Whenever it finds one that is loyal.

10) LOVE puts to trial the desire of all its servants;
And if it finds it vain, it turns it
in so many shapes, that he complaints more every day.

11) LOVE made this big giant Cyclops
So full of love for Galatea,
That possibly no lover burned as much as he did.

12) LOVE made Paris so courageous,
That he dared to abduct beautiful Helen,
Beacause Love makes each heart generous.

13) LOVE, the son of Venus, made her
Burn for Adonis and with such flames:
Because Love infuses its star also from heaven.

14) LOVE made Jove descend many times
In different shapes, of bull, of swan, of gold,
And, in shape of eagle, he also took Ganymedes.

And it made Pasiphe fall in love with a Bull.

Triumph of the Vain World

CHAPTER ABOUT THE TRIUMPH OF THE VAIN WORLD

World, you are vainly loved by the mad,
And a fool thinks he can bring you on his donkey,
Because the stupid only trust your state.

Lazyness kept Sardanapalus idle between feathers,
Lustful concubines and banquet,
For so long that he lost the habit of reigning.

Hyppolita endured such efforts, that she is the only
Of the amazons who is crowned by merit:
And her name still flies in Scythia and in Greece.

Actheon was inflamed of love for an heavenly
Person, so much that he was transformed in deer:
So a man should not put his desire too high.

Rightly did Laura triumph over the perverted
Child Cupid, because she neither moved
Her eye from virtue nor ever put a foot wrong.

Antiochus was so secret, that he almost
Died for his love for Stratonica;
But the kind physician helped him effectively.

Grace does not go by chance, but with reason,
To the discreet and wise, for in love can be proud
He that hides his strongest passion.

Anger filled king Herod so much
That he ordered to kill Mariamne than
He calls her, and crying suffers with love.

Psyche was patient in what happened to her,
And because of that she found help in her troubles,
And in the end was made a Goddess, to be an example for us.

An error make Jabob a slave for seven years,
Because he did not speak of Rachel to Laban;
But time repaired all his damage.

In Penelopes there was such perseverance,
That, by weaving and undoing her web,
She deserved to rejoin her beloved Ulysses.

Egeus made for himself a cruel doubt,
So that he was quick to seek death in the sea,
As soon as he saw Theseus come back with black sails.

Sophonisba was faithful to Massinissa
Beyond doubt, because she promised to drink poison
If she were forced to follow the triumph.

Nesso deceived when he said to Dianira:
Give this cloth with blood to Hercules,
If it ever happens that you have to fight for love.

In Hipermestra, as in a cunning snake,
There was wisdom because wearing the clohes of a woman
She saved her husband who was bloodless with fear.

Chance fell on Pompeyus, that for many years
Had seated at the top of the wheel,
But in the end fortune submerged him with troubles.

Emilia, the faithful wife of Scipio, showed
Modesty; because when she found him with a maid,
He did not talk of his sin not to make it public.

A spark brings danger of a big fire:
See how Cesar was killed in the senate
By only two people; after he survived the anger of Sulla.

Experience was in Rhea, who after hiding
Jove in mount Ida, ordered to make noise
So that he could not be found because of his crying.

Time, you that hurry men to death,
You saved Nestor, and if in the end he came to an end,
It seems impossible to think of such a life.

Oblivion, you are the end and boundary
Of all, you took to Lethe Elice and Dido,
And among your ruins you have fame and time.

Inner strength made happy the death of
Lucretia: to clean her fame
She killed herself, and she prepared for the offender a dark net,

Giving an example to those who love their own name and honour.

SONNET OF EXCUSE

I see my error, but I follow
The common deception, and I esteem this to be a small fault,
Because being wrong together with the majority of people is better
Than saving oneself in case of a public damage.

I see men go deceiving themselves
And try to make hours seem short to them:
So, in order to make the deception even greater,
I have made this game, and I am the first to condemn it.

Because there is nothing else to spur it, but wings
That time, which is so precious and dear,
Sends away, like the string of a bow sends an arrow.

But since there is no way to stop it,
And escaping tedium is a natural instinct,
I excuse myself for learning from nature.

(with an addendum by Jean-Michel David)

www.tarot-history.com

Jean-Claude Flornoy and I live at the foot of a Medieval village in Western France.

The town’s historical interest make it a favourite destination for teachers who wish to organise an instructive school outing for their classes. Diverse local options allow a fairly wide choice of activity for these groups. Among them is our workshop on early printing and colouring methods.

As is usual when undertaking manual activities with children, we limit the number of participants. The emphasis is on printing techniques, paper making, and stencil-colouring as a way of popularising the coloured-image market at a time when paper was becoming an affordable alternative to parchment.

For centuries a primary source of energy was water, and the river that winds through our valley was exploited by numerous mills. Among these was a paper mill whose production furnished the paper for the playing cards made here at the end of the 18th century. The local museum houses the woodblock used to print these cards, and Jean-Claude has re-edited a restored, stencil-coloured version of this deck. The children colour an enlarged version of one of these cards, but first they undertake three Dodal tarot images (hermit, popess, and emperor: also a bit enlarged).

Perfect stencil colouring is very finicky work. However, for beginners it is encouraging that even somewhat faulty results can look quite good. It is always magical to lift off the stencil and see what passing the brush over all those little holes actually accomplishes. Everyone always appreciates the RED – it goes on so well, and is so rich!!

As Jean-Claude is a cartier-enlumineur, and the tarot is his speciality, working on tarots seems perfectly natural. France can be said to have the tarot as part of its genetic cultural makeup. Furthermore, there are (non-divinatory) tarot players all over the country. Public schools are fiercely secular here, but no teacher has ever balked at, or even reacted to the use of the three Dodal images. We make no attempt to deal with what these images might convey, and the children take this work home with them…so we can say (well, we won’t say it really) that the tarot is naturally introduced into the environment of each and every one of these young souls, to wend its way as it can. The traditional message was always subliminal, direct. What better way to perpetuate it, unpolluted by generations of verbiage and speculation.

web: www.tarot-history.com

addendum by Jean-Michel David

In addition to the work of the Flornoys, Pierrick Pinot, Illuminator-Painter and creator of Tarot de la Félicité, Le Tarot d’Argolance and the Tarot de Minuit, has also worked as ‘artist in residence’ at the school Léo Férré in Ambrières-Les-Vallées in Mayenne, France.

As an artistic and cultural project under the auspices of the French Department of Education, and in collaboration with the headmaster and teachers, arose the wonderful Léo Férré Tarot.

This project made it possible for children to work on the syllabus of History in connection with Literature and Arts. The collaboration of 72 students worked on a traditional “Tarot de Marseilles” design under the combined leadership of Mr Gilles Heuzé, Plastic Art teacher and Pierrick Pinot.

web: argolance.free.fr

www.alissahall.com

He looks nervous. New clients always have the same look about them. They come in and sit down, try to make things start too quickly. They might even smile. But, then they open their mouth, and the same old phrase pops out. “I’ve never done this before…”

“Relax, it’s fun. There’s nothing to be afraid of,” I murmur reassuringly, same as I have thousands of times. You do this long enough and you can tell just by how they react — the tone of their voice, a nervous flutter of hands — this is a virgin. Uncharted territory. Scared and excited all at once.

He smiles, just a flash, like a light bulb — bright, and then it’s gone. “What do I do?”

I push my dark hair behind my ear, “Just relax. I’ll light some incense and candles for us, help set the mood.” Plucking a stick of the lavender blend, I light the tip; nice, not overpowering. Soft and welcoming.

He smiles again, that flashing, nervous grin — incandescent teeth, there and gone. “How did you begin… I mean, how did you start doing this?”

Turning from the incense holder, I let my match touch the black wick of my favorite red candle. It sputters into incendiary life, the glow smoothing out the small room’s shadows. They all ask the same questions; I give them all the same answers. “I started when I was a teenager.”

“You were just a kid!” he says, scoffing.

Dispassionately, I face the stranger again. “I knew what I was doing… both then, and now.”

The man rubs his palms on his blue-jeaned thighs, shrugging. “Sure, if you say so,” he offers, an apology perhaps. His face changes, brightening, as he adds, “my friends all said you were really good, that you really knew what you were doing. That’s why I’m here.” He glances around my tiny room once more, his eye never stopping on the curiosities for display. “So how we do this, do I give you the money first, or…?”

I cock my head and smile at him before turning my back to this stranger while I speak. “When you’re here with me… it’s entirely up to you. This is about you… it isn’t about me.”

His eyes change, darkening as he hears those last words. Ah, this is the moment. Now he’s dropping the façade. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re here? What are you looking for?” I probe.

The last traces of polite chitchat leave his voice. “My wife and I are unhappy,” he begins.

I know better than to speak aloud as the confession leaves his lips, allowing my silence to draw forth more words. One of the reasons they come to me, as anyone in my profession well knows, is to talk. “I don’t know what’s happening any more between us, I don’t know what to think. I don’t even know if she loves me any more…”

He drops his head and I hide my smile as I catch him spinning his wedding ring. Freudian. “You’ve been unhappy…” I repeat back to him, just a moment before the silence becomes uncomfortable for us both. Scented smoke curls into the air, ethereal arabesques dancing above us before dissipating, like the words we speak.

He nods slowly and even with his head lowered, I hear the tears creep into his voice. Perhaps he’s ashamed of his emotions. His face is strained; it hurts him just to talk. That’s why they usually end up at my door. They need someone.

“We’ve been married for years, but I just… I need to know. I need to know…” he repeats, looking at the red candle’s flickering instead of at me.

With a small smile of encouragement, I nod in understanding. It’s a fine line… you don’t want to pry. “I can help,” I say, quietly. My voice becomes smooth with the confidence of a woman who knows her talents and abilities.

He looks up and nods. “I don’t really do this, you know,” he insists again.

I grin, taking one of his hands in mine, “I can tell.”

At the joke, he smiles once more… not the light bulb pop, but a slow authentic smile, one I can see reflected from within his amber eyes.

“You ready?” I ask softly.

He doesn’t speak, but squeezes my hand in a positive response. As his eyes meet mine, I see him beginning to fall inside of me, and I turn my gaze away, unwilling to use my charisma as an unfair advantage.

“I think I’m a little scared,” he finally admits. Honesty, at last. This might yet be a good experience, for the both of us. I nod slowly, dropping his hand, as well as my eyes.

“It’s ok,” I say softly. “I’ve done this for a long time. Nothing will happen here that you aren’t ready for. The Universe has taught me that.”

He shrugs, acting disinterested once again. “So how do we begin?” sitting forward, his voice loses the softness of emotion while attending to business.

Unhurried… at last, I sit down at the small, mahogany table in the chair across from him. If you sit down too soon, you may never know why they think they’re here, asking their favors of you.

But, essentially, they all want the same thing.

Show me… show me…. Show me what I’ve never seen but always wanted to believe in. Tell me that I’m right. Make me believe I’m not alone in this world. Help me understand the pain I feel. Make sense of this nightmareÉ I’m scared, and I don’t know what to do.

Gently, I ease the tools of my trade from their pouch. My Tarot cards slide into my hands, familiar rectangles of cardboard and ink — the cards are scratched, the color slightly faded with time, their edges soiled. Years and years of shuffling; a thousand times I’ve riffled these cards for those who sit before me, wanting to take a piece of my gift for themselves.

And, I give it to them. I give it away.

When it’s over, they often say, “I’ll never forget you,” but that’s not what they mean. They mean your words will live on, inside me, long after I’ve forgotten your real name. Even those who mock me, they too will remember what I’ve said, if only to live their entire life to prove me wrong. But, they remember. I know it even better than they do.

So, I give them something worth remembering. I put away my insecurities and fears while speaking aloud the flashing pictures that no make sense, firing between the synapses inside my mind. What if they laugh? You can’t let those doubts in. Because those fears… they make the reading about me.

And, the reading… it’s never about me.

Softly, I turn down the light.

originally posted on Aeclectic Tarot

Once upon a time, in the early spring of 2005, I was exchanging private messages on Aeclectic Tarot with Karen Mahony of Magic-realist Press in Prague. We were discussing their latest deck project. I had long been a fan of the Tarot of Prague, and like a good fan, had written gushing messages to Karen telling her just how good that deck was. As a lover of fairy and folk tales, I was delighted to hear that magic-realist was to release a Fairytale Tarot in the not-to-distant-future. Karen was sighing about the amount of work they had – working on the deck and the book was eating up all her and her partner Alex’s time. “I won’t write the next book”, she told me. “I’ll find someone else to do it”. Then she mentioned that despite the heavy workload, they were already thinking about their next project, a Tarot deck based on the animal etchings of JJ Grandville, the 19th Century French illustrator.

At the end of that message, she casually asked – “do you know anything about Grandville?” I was brought up in a French-speaking region, where every child knows the 17th Century Fables of La Fontaine, and very likely the book version illustrated by JJ Grandville. If they are lucky, as I was, they will also have discovered Gulliver and Robinson Crusoe through the keen eyes and lively pencil of that illustrator. Later, I met him again in the company of Balzac, the great social novelist, and of the Romantics Musset and Georges Sand. Although I didn’t know much about his life, I confidently answered that I’d admired Grandville since childhood – and knew a fair amount about the times he lived in. So Karen suggested I write the book to accompany what was then called simply “the Grandville Tarot”, and I suggested visiting her and Alex in Prague, so we could discuss the project.

A few hours later, Karen sent me a few samples. I saw a king penguin sitting on a throne on the ice pack, holding a cup, and looking very reluctant to move anywhere, while his loose socks accordion around his ankles. A half-comical, half-dignified figure, that King of Cups captured my heart immediately. The Fool that Karen sent leapt straight into my imagination. A rat was trudging around the countryside, looking rugged and determined, ready to take on the world. Here was a Fool midway between the juggler-vagrant attacked by dogs in the Tarot of Marseille, and the newer “leap off the cliff” Fool – though this Fool looked like a veteran rather than a rookie! I wrote back to Karen saying I just had to write that book – those images were too eloquent, and told too many stories, and I wanted to be the one to tell some of them.

Fast forward a few weeks to May 2005. I flew to Prague, and Karen and Alex welcomed me with an open-hearted hospitality I could only think of as Middle-European. We pored over thick old tomes full of the etchings of Grandville – “this fox and hen pair would make a wonderful 7 of Swords”, “we thought this procession of scarabs in church paraphernalia would make a good Hierophant”, and “how about this burning phoenix for Judgement?” I supplied Karen with some stories to go with the sample cards she had sent. The Story of the Fool featured a rat that jumped off a priest’s wardrobe followed by his mouse companion. Except that, on closer inspection, I began to suspect that my rat Fool was in fact a lion! I scrambled back to my Balzac Animal Tales illustrated by Grandville – and there indeed was the Voyage of an African Lion to Paris. My imagination could not supply a wardrobe large enough for a lion to jump off, so it became the second storey of a barn in the French countryside. Despite my failing to recognise the king of the Animals in his ragged Fool’s garb, Karen was pleased with my sample stories. I suggested a format for the book – in addition to short stories or vignettes, with more classic card descriptions, for each card, I would write a section on Grandville’s life, times and art, another on tarot history, some general introductory words about the tarot and a “how to read” section with spreads. Karen wanted to ask another Aeclectic Tarot member, Paula Goodman Wilder, to write some sample readings in her characteristic witty reading style. I was confident that we could make a good book out of all this.

Back in Geneva, my first stop was our public art library, to investigate everything they had about JJ Grandville. I found several of his illustrated books, reproductions of his lithographic series The Metamorphoses of the Day, which had made him famous at the age of 25, a couple of monographs, a study on illustration in 19th Century France, some journals and letters. I was to find an equal trough on the internet. Karen, Alex and I had agreed that I would work off black-and-white rough cards, which they would put up on the internet on a private work-in-progress site.

That summer was a fairly eventful one for me. I spent about half my time in the mountains, and the whole of August in Namibia, Southern Africa. Grandville and his animals came with me wherever I went. I wrote many of the card stories and descriptions between the desert and the Atlantic ocean, in the seaside resort of Swakopmund in Namibia, in the hot and dry capital, Windhoek, or in small stopping-points in that vast desert country. I thanked the Tarot Gods for internet cafés so I could supply Karen with my material. The contrast between Grandville, his life and artistic style teeming with animal-like people that made up the cards, and the rugged, almost empty Namibia, could not have been greater, but somewhere between the two a space opened where my imagination could flourish. I was very keen to set all the stories at the time of Grandville, and in France. But how to make sure the stories and descriptions were relevant for our time, and for an English-speaking culture that would probably know little of 1830s France? The Namibians, like most Africans, are keen on divination, so I was given many opportunities to practice my tarot reading skills during that stay. This daily practice I was afforded, with people who generally knew nothing of Tarot, helped me keep my card description real whenever I returned to my laptop. What, indeed, does a fox running away with a willing hen have to say about an everyday human life situation in the early 21st Century?

After a few months, the project went quiet for a while, as Karen and Alex concentrated all their efforts on publishing and launching the Fairytale Tarot. Then in early 2006, Karen contacted me with the details of the rewrites she and her professional editor suggested. By then, I had started a job with the United Nations AIDS programme in Geneva, and was caught up in a big project there, which involved a fair bit of travelling. So started one of the craziest, and most fulfilling times of my life. Every day I would be writing and thinking about AIDS, and every evening and late into the night, Grandville and the increasingly beautiful Fantastic Menagerie Tarot drew me into their transformed world, where animals and men become each other. Once again, the divergence between my life and writing was only apparent. Grandville lived through a terrible cholera epidemic in 1832, at a time when he worked as a political caricaturist. Famine was endemic in France. In his lifetime, tuberculosis ravaged Europe, a seemingly unmovable disease that broke families and gnawed at the fabric of society. Grandville himself lost three of his four children, and his beloved first wife Henriette, to various infections. His seemingly innocent animal drawings grew out of his observations of a vigorous and creative society, which also had to live with fear, loss, hunger and constant disease. He drew them not as escapism, but as social satire and commentary on the deep contrasts he saw around him. The chasm between 19th Century France and a creative but AIDS-ridden Africa, closed, bridged by Grandville’s timeless drawings, and by magic-realist’s astonishing work of selection and transformation that turned Grandville’s book etchings into the Fantastic Menagerie Tarot.

Geneva, 2 June 2006

(abridged from Nina Lee Braden’s copyrighted list from 2002, the year in which the issue of this Newsletter appeared – the full and most recent updated list may be viewed online here)

Since I like to read fiction, and since I like Tarot, I like to read fiction which has Tarot in it. Tarot is such a wonderful system of ymbols, that I find it a natural for writers. Increasingly, more and more writers seem to be using Tarot in their works. Some of them have obviously done their homework and are familiar with the Tarot. Others use it for effect without any knowledge.

Check out the following books which use Tarot. Some of them are quite good; others are not. In addition, I have a list of books which do not have Tarot, but which, in my not so humble opinion, “shoulda had” Tarot. Most of these books are what I would call metaphysical fiction.

Personal note: some of the books on this list are truly amazing, wonderful, tremendous and powerful works of literature. Others are fun reads, good light entertainment. A few are just plain bad. Inclusion on this list is no assurance of literary merit nor of any accuracy in the history or use of Tarot, only of using the Tarot as a literary device. [É] Unfortunately, a great number of these books are out of print.

If you know of a book which mentions Tarot but which is not mentioned on this list, please email me, so that I can revise my list. I wish to thank all of those who have helped me with this list over the years. I have been working on this list since about 1991. It has been a labor of love. In particular, I wish to thank Diane Wilkes for several contributions to the list. If you would like to read about how I got started with compiling this list, please read Discovering Tarot in Literature: The Journey, Part I .

→ indicates a book which I consider of great literary merit or my personal favorites [please note that Nina distinguishes these on her site].

The List

Adams, Deborah
      All the Dark Disguises (I really love Adams’ books)

Adams, Richard
      → The Tyger Voyage (Juvenile)

Albert, Susan
      Wittig Witches’ Bane

Allende, Isabel
      → The House of Spirits (Movie adaptation may use non-Tarot divination cards)

Anthony, Piers
      Chaining the Lady
      → Cluster
      Kirlian Quest
      → Tarot (Originally in 3 separate volumes–excellent, excellent, excellent)
      Thousandstar
      Viscious Circle

Ashe, Geoffrey The Finger and the Moon

Atwood, Margaret
      → The Robber Bride

Baxter, Charles
      “Kiss Away.” Believers

Barnes, Linda.
      “Lucky Penny” in Sisters in Crime edited by Marilyn Wallace

Bayley, Barrington J.
      The Grand Wheel

Bischoff, David
      The Destiny Dice

Block, Francesca Lia
      The Hanged Man (Young adult. Many people really like this book, but it left me flat.)

Bradley, Marion Zimmer
      Heartlight (Several mere mentions, lots of ceremonial magick)
      The Inheritor (Mere mention)
      Witchlight (Fleeting)

Breton, Andre
      → Arcanum XVII

Bronwyn, Lundell
      Another Poet Among Us “Missing Ingredient.”

Brown, Mary
      Dancing the Jack (Fleeting)

Brust, Steven, and Megan Lindholm
      Gypsy (Dark, futuristic science fiction)

Byers, Richard Lee
      Dark Fortune (Horror)

Bull, Emma
      Bone Dance (Science Fiction)

Calvino, Italo
      → The Castle of Crossed Destinies (Highly regarded by many, but I wasn’t particularly impressed)

Camp, John See John Sandford.

Card, Orson Scott
      “The Changed Man and the King of Words” in The Changed Man. Originally published in Omni, December, 1981.

Carr, John Dickson
      The Eight of Swords

Casteneda, Carlos
      Several

Cate, Nathan
      Sanctuary of the Gods

Chopra, Deepak
      The Return of Merlin (Too bad that it’s the bad guy who uses Tarot)

Chopra, Gautama
      Child of the Dawn

Civil-Brown, Sue
      Chasing Rainbow (Heroine a psychic)

Clarke, Lindsay
      → The Chymical Wedding 1989 (Much alchemy. Stunningly written. Highly recommended)

Cook, Thomas
      Night Secrets (Brief)

Cooper, Louise
      The Book of Paradox (One of the first books that I read which featured Tarot)

Cornwell, Patricia D
      All That Remains

Coville, Bruce
      Eyes of the Tarot (Juvenile. Very well done, as is all of his work)

Creeley, Robert.
      Pieces (Poetry. Quotes Waite on the Fool. Also mentions astrology and playing cards)

Crichton, Michael
      → Travels (See related article: ‘Michael Crichton a New Ager?’)

Crowell, Jean
      → Necessary Madness (fleeting)

Crowley, Aleister
      → Moonchild

Cunningham, Elizabeth
      Return of the Goddess: A Divine Comedy

Davies, Robertson
      The Rebel Angels
      The Lyre of Orpheus

Davis, Dorothy Salisbury
      A Death in the Life

Deaver, Jeffrey
      The Devil’s Teardrop (Mere mention and negative at that)

Deitz, Tom
      Dreambuilder (Deitz has a wonderful musical Tarot which he features in three of his books)
      The Gryphon King
      Soulsmith
      Windmaster’s Bane (Mere mention)
      → Wordwright

Delany, Samuel
      Nova
      Triton

De Lint, Charles
      The Dreaming Place (Young adult)
      Moonheart
      Moonlight and Vines (three short stories previously published elsewhere)
      Trader (Mere mention, but lots of great stuff on divination)

Devlin, Mary
      Murder on the Canterbury Pilgrimage

Dillard, J.M.
      → The Lost Years (Star Trek and Tarot!)

di Prima, Diane
      → poem in Mary Greer’s Tarot for Your Self

Dunstan, Stephen
      Tarot Poems

Eco, Umberto
      → Foucault’s Pendulum (Fleeting)

Edghill, Rosemary
      Book of Moons (Brief, but lots of Wicca)
      Bowl of Night
      Met by Moonlight (Mere mention, lots of Wicca)
      Speak Daggers to Her (Modest Tarot, lots of Wicca, Tarot on cover)

Egan, Doris
      The Gate of Ivory (Brief Tarot, significant non-Tarot divination cards)

Eisner, William
      The Sevigne Letters

Elder, Catherine
      The Sword and the Rose

Eliot, T.S.
      → The Waste Land

Ellin, Stanley
      House of Cards (Brief. See also the movie)

Emerson, Ru
      Princess of Flames

Farina, Richard
      Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me

Fennelly, Tony
      Closet Hanging
      The Glory Hole Murders
      1-900-DEAD (Lots on astrology)

Finch, Sheila
      Infinity’s Web

Fitch, Janet
      → White Oleander (Really lovely book with a few fleeting Tarot references)

Fortune, Dion
      → The Sea Priestess (Much ceremonial magic, brief Tarot scene)

Fowles, John
      → The Magus

Foyrer, Gayle
      Prince of Cups (Romance)

Gates, Charlene Elizabeth
      The Tarot Trumps: Their Origin, Archetypal Imagery, and Use and Some Works of English Literature (doctoral dissertation)

Geary, Patricia
      Strange Toys (indirect & cover)

Gentle, Mary
      Rats and Gargoyles (Brief, but strong alchemy)

George, Demetra
      Mysteries of the Dark Moon

George, Elizabeth
      → Deception on His Mind (Mere mention)
      → Missing Joseph (Passing, but fair amount of Wicca)

Gilman, Dorothy
      The Clairvoyant Countess (Cover, mere mention, strong clairvoyance)

Goldstein, Lisa
      Travelers in Magic (Photos, also Mexican Lotto Cards)

Gotlieb, Phyllis
      Emperor, Swords, Pentacles

Goudge, Elizabeth
      The White Witch (Historically questionable)

Grafton, Sue
      “O” is for Outlaw

Grahn, Judy
      → The Queen of Swords (Verse play, indirect)
      → The Queen of Wands (Poetry, indirect)

Green, Kate
      Black Dreams
      → Shattered Moon

Greenberg, Martin H. & Lawrence Schimel, eds.
      The Fortune Teller (One Tarot story)
      Tarot Fantastic (16 stories and poems by a variety of authors)

Gresham, William Lindsay
      → Nightmare Alley

Guthrie, Al
      Murder by Tarot

Hager, Jean
      Blooming Murder

Hahn, Mary
      Downing The Time of the Witch (Juvenile)

Hambly, Barbara
      Dog Wizard
      Stranger at the Wedding

Harrington, R.E.
      7 of Swords

Harris, Joanne
      Chocolat (a marvelous book in many ways)

Heinlein, Robert
      Stranger in a Strange Land

Herbert, Frank
      Children of Dune (Mere mention)
      Dune Messiah (Not sure if it qualifies for “real” Tarot)

Hetmann, Frederik
      Madru

Higgins, Jack
      The Eagle Has Landed (Brief but noteworthy)

Highwater, Jamake
      The Language of Vision

Hoffman, Alice
      → Practical Magic

Hulme, Keri
      → The Bone People (Brief specific Tarot scene, but strong use of basic Tarot archetypes)

Hyvard, Jeanne
      Waterweed in the Wash House

Jackson, Shirley
      → Hangsaman

Jarvis, Kel
      Lady Tarot (Verse play)

Keene, Carolyn
      The Fortune Teller’s Secret Nancy Drew.
      Hits and Misses (Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys) (brief)

Kellerman, Faye
      → Grievous Sin (Mere mention)

King, Laurie R.
      → The Beekeeper’s Apprentice
      → A Darker Place (Mere mention of Tarot but much alchemy)

King, Stephen
      The Eyes of the Dragon (Mere mention)

      The Gunslinger: The Dark Tower I (Deck used has some non-standard additions)

Kopp, Sheldon.
      → The Hanged Man: Psychotherapy and the Forces of Darkness (Memoirs and musings of a psychotherapist, using eleven Tarot cards as the organization)

Kotzwinkle, William
      Fata Morgana
      Queen of Swords (Indirect)

Kurtz, Katherine
      → Lammas Night

Laubenthal, Sanders
      Anne Excalibur

Lee, Tanith
      A Heroine of the World

Lem, Carol
      The Hermit’s Journey: Tarot Poems for Meditation

London, Cait
      The Daddy Candidate (Romance)

Lorens, M. K.
      Sorrowheart (Mystery)

Magarshack, David
      Death Cuts a Caper

Makino, Erika B.
      Six of Cups: A Circle of Stones (Short stories)

Meade, Marion
      Sybille (Short but noteworthy. Historically questionable)

McCarthy, Cormac
      → Blood Meridian

MacGregor, T.J.
      → The Hanged Man

McKillip, Patricia A.
      Fool’s Run (Indirect)

McMillan, Terry
      A Day Late & a Dollar Short

Mathewson, Joseph
      Alicia’s Trump

Matteson, Stefanie
      Murder on the Silk Road

Melville, Jennie
      Tarot’s Tower

Meyer, Julie
      In the Cards (Romance)

Meyers, Annette
      Tender Death

Morris, Winifred
      With Magical Horses to Ride (Juvenile)

Muller, Marcia
      Ask the Cards a Question (Mere mention)

Murphey, Warren & R. Sapir
      The Ghost in the Machine (Destroyer series #90)

Nolen, Han
      Dancing on the Edge (Mere mention, but lots of metaphysics)

Norman, Marsha
      → The Fortune Teller (Signi-ficant. Nicely done)

O’Har, George M.
      Psychic Fair (Fleeting Tarot but much Ouija Board)

Park, Jacqueline
      The Secret Book of Grazia dei Rossi (Short but significant, historically questionable)

Pavic, Milorad
      Last Love in Constantinople: A Tarot Novel for Divination (Popular, but I didn’t like it)

Piercy, Marge
      → “Laying Down the Tower” cluster in To Be of Use (Truly awesome)
      → Small Change (Brief)

Plath, Sylvia
      → Ariel (Assorted poems)

Pollack, Rachel
      → Golden Vanity (Slight, indirect)

Pollack, R. & C. Matthews, ed.
      Tarot Tales

Powers, Tim
      Expiration Date (bare mention)
      → Last Call (Significant and excellent)

Pratchett, Terry
      Light Fantastic (Discworld series, “Caroc” cards)
      Lords and Ladies (Discworld series, “Caroc” cards)
      Mort (Discworld series, “Caroc” cards)

Pynchon, Thomas
      → Gravity’s Rainbow (Known Tarot, just not known how extensive)

Rafferty, Carin
      Touch of Magic (Romance)
      The Lake of Darkness

Rich, Adrienne
      → “Twenty-One Love Poems” (Indirect)

Riley, Judith Merkle
      The Master of All Desires (historically inaccurate, but a fun tale of intrigue during the time of Nostradamus and the Medicis)

Ritkin, Virginia
      Fate of the Silver Moon (Audio book)

Robbins, Tom
      Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas

Robertson, Garcia y.
      “Gypsy Trade”

Rose, Carol Jean
      Step-Mother
      The Tarot Gypsy Trips

Rowling, J. K.
      → Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Delightful book of interest to those of metaphysical bent. Tarot only a fleeting mention, however)

Sandford, John
      The Empress File (Formerly published under John Camp)
      The Fool’s Run (Formerly published under John Camp)
      Mind Prey (Mere mention)
      Silent Prey (Brief but significant)

Satterhwait, Walter
      The Hanged Man

Savic, Sally
      Elysian Fields (Bare mention)

Sellers, M. R.
      Harm None: A Rowan Gant Investigation

Sherrell, Carl
      Arcane

Shields, Jody
      The Fig Eater

Shitcher, Susan
      The Fool Reversed (Young adult)

Simmons, Robert
      Earthfire

Simon, Jean
      Wild Card

Slade, Michael
      Ripper (Horror. Very graphically violent. Strong use of Tarot)

Smith, Julie
      The Axeman’s Jazz (Very brief)
      Other People’s Skeletons (Short but significant, much New Age)

Spillard, Anne
      The Cartomancer (Divination with playing cards)

Stansberger, Richard
      “Arcana: Poems from the Tarot” Glass Hat: Poems 1979

Stein, Diane
      “Queen of Hearts” in Lady Sun & Lady Moon

Steinbeck, J.
      → The Winter of Our Discontent

Stockenberg, Antoinette
      Beloved

Stone, Irving
      The Agony and the Ecstasy (Fictional life of Michaelangelo with references to game of Tarrochi)

Stuart, Anne
      Prince of Swords (Romance)

Sullivan, Evelin
      Four of Fools (Significant)

Sussex, L.
      ‘The Man Hanged Upside Down’

Tannen, Mary
      Second Sight

Taylor, Laurie Aylma
      “Fortune Tellers.” Poem in Xanadu 3 ed. Jane Yolen

Taylor, Peter
      Oracle at Stoneleigh Court (Brief)

Thurm, Marian
      The Clairvoyant (Minor but significant. Somewhat accurate portrayal of professional psychic)

Tryon, Tom
      Night Magic

Wakoski, Diane
      → Assorted poems including “From the Tarot Deck”

Warner, Mignon
      Death in Time (Mere mention)
      The Girl Who Was Clairvoyant
      A Medium for Murder (Brief)
      → The Tarot Murders

Webb, Don
      Essential Saltes (Mere mention but lots of alchemy)

Weick, Stewart
      Mage

Whitten, Leslie H
      The Alchemist

Wilhelm, Kate
      The Hamlet Trap
      Seven Kinds of Death

Willard, Nancy
      “The Friendship Tarot” in Between Friends, ed. Mickey Pearlman (title, actual cards not Tarot, picture of Tree of Life layout)

Williams, Charles
      → The Greater Trumps (significant, classic work)

Williams, Tad
      Otherworld (indirect, Hanged Man archetype)

Wilson, F. Paul
      The Keep

Wilson, Robert Anton
      The Cosmic Trigger, Vol. I. (non-fiction)

Wilson, Robert Anton
      The Earth Will Shake (The Historical Illuminatus trilogy)
      → Masks of the Illuminati
      The Trick Top Hat (Schrodinger’s Cat trilogy)
      The Universe Next Door (Schrodinger’s Cat trilogy)
      The Widow’s Son (mere mention)

Wilson, Robert Anton and Robert Shea The Eye in the Pyramid (Illuminatus! trilogy)
      The Golden Apple (Illuminatus! trilogy, mere mention)
      Leviathan (Illuminatus! trilogy)

Winterson, Jeanette
      → Gut Symmetries

Worth, Valerie
      Gypsy Gold (Young adult, no historical accuracy at all)

Yate, Allan Coriolanus
      The Chariot

Yeager, Dorian
      Cancellation by Death.
      Eviction by Death (Brief)

Yeats, William Butler
      → “Stories of Red Hanrahan,” “Blood and the Moon,” others.

Yorke, Christy
      The Wishing Garden (One of the most extensive uses of Tarot that I’ve run across)

Zelazny, Roger
      Amber series

[thank you Nina Lee Braden for this list - please check for updates since this Newsletter online at her site.]

Chapter I

Once upon a time there was a young man who made his living by travelling from fair to fair. He would do tricks for people, and everyone would laugh and clap and throw some pennies. But one day, this young man, whose name was The Bateleur, decided he had had enough of doing the same tricks, again and again. Each town he visited looked the same. Each person who clapped, he felt he had seen a thousand times. He was bored. So he folded up his little table, packed up his few belongings and decided to go on a long, long voyage. He wanted to discover the world! He wanted some adventure!

Chapter II

But he didn’t know where to go. So he stopped off at a lady’s house for direction. Her name was The Popess. She was a very wise woman and many people went to see her when they had questions. He begged her to give him some advice. “I don’t know where you must go, but I can tell how to go”, she said. “You must listen to what your heart says. If your heart says go right, go right. If it says go left, go left.”

Chapters III and IV

The Bateleur decided to go right, and he reached a castle. In this castle lived an Empress and an Emperor. The kind Empress welcomed him herself, and provided him with food and a bed to sleep in for the night. The Emperor was a powerful Emperor, but a just one, and his people loved him. The Emperor gave The Bateleur permission to travel through his lands.

Chapter V

Next morning, the Bateleur thanked the Empress and the Emperor for their kindness, and went on his way. He walked many miles, over hills and dales, and reached a forest. But as it happens sometimes in forests, he got lost. He began to feel scared, lonely and hopeless. He cried out “What am I going to do now?”

While he was sitting with his head in his hands, The Pope came by. The Pope was a friend of The Popess who had already helped The Bateleur at the start of his journey. Do you remember her? The Pope cheered up the Bateleur and gave him a map to guide him out of the forest.

“ Good-bye and go well”, said The Pope. “Never forget, that if you have a map, you cannot get lost.”

Chapter VI

With the help of the map, The Bateleur walked to the end of the forest, and reached a meadow, with fruit trees and sheep grazing there. It was so beautiful, that he hesitated to go on. “Maybe I’ll just build a cabin and live here for the rest of my life.” “But if I stay here, I’ll never know what is beyond the horizon.” “ Travelling like this can be so tiring.” “But it would be a shame to abandon my dream.” The poor Bateleur just couldn’t make up his mind whether to continue his journey or not.

Just then the sun set. Never have you seen a scene like this. The sky was suddenly golden, red, orange, pink and violet with blue glints peeping from behind some cottonwool clouds. The birds filled the air with their evening songs. The Bateleur was amazed, and felt such peace and Love in his heart, that he hesitated no longer. “If this is part of the world I am to discover, then my choice is made. I will continue my journey.”

Chapter VII

After a good night’s sleep on some soft grass, he was awakened by the sound of wheels. A man was driving past on a cart pulled by two horses. “Hail to you, man,” The Bateleur cried out. “Will you sell me your fine cart and horses? I have gold pieces in my bag and will pay you well.” The man agreed to sell him his horses and cart. How proud our Bateleur was now. “This is wonderful!”, he shouted. “I can make my horses gallop and I feel like a charioteer! I will call my cart a Chariot! And it will take me to the end of the world!!”

Chapter VIII

But our friend was not paying attention. He was driving too fast and hit a large stone in the road. He veered off to the left, and his cart crashed into a cabin. The cabin was all in pieces. So was the cart. “Ooooh!” cried an angry voice. “Look what you have done to my cabin!” A lady come out from behind some trees where she had been hanging her washing. “Now how are you going to pay me for this! Justice must be done!” The poor Bateleur had no money left in his purse – he had spent it all on his horses and cart. But as he was an honest man, and felt terrible about having destroyed the lady’s house, he gave his horses to her. And he continued his journey on foot, not feeling too pleased with himself at all, as you can imagine!

Chapter VIIII

An old man was walking slowly on the road in front of him. He was The Hermit and was known far and wide. He would go from village to village, teaching people how to find the truth. His carried a stick to support him. He carried a lantern to guide him at night. The Bateleur caught up with him. “Good day, sir”, he said. The Hermit looked at him for a long time. Then he said “Good day to you, Bateleur.” “How do you know my name?” asked the Bateleur. “It is written in your eyes, and I can read your eyes”, said the Hermit. “You know my friend, most people think that time passes. Actually, it stays where it is.” And then suddenly he disappeared. One minute he was there, one minute he wasn’t. The Bateleur rubbed his eyes and thought “I must be dreaming.”

Chapters X and XI

So much had happened in such a few days! The Bateleur had met so many people, seen so many new things, had done so much! It was starting to make his head turn! It was like those Wheels of Fortune he would see at the fairs he used to travel to. You would turn the Wheel, but would never know what you would win. “Hmmm”, he thought! “Life is full of unexpected surprises. Life requires courage”, he thought. “To conquer life, one needs Strength.”

Chapter XII

And so he pondered on life and its twists and turns. He pondered on what he had left behind. He pondered on what he had gained. He pondered on what he had lost. He felt in between two worlds – like he was hanging upside down! “Today, I’m like a Hanged Man!”, he laughed. “Just hanging here and pondering!”

Chapter XIII

Goodness, how our Bateleur has changed. One can hardly recognise him anymore! He was just a young man who knew little about life at the beginning of our story. All he knew before were his tricks, his fairs, and the few towns of his county. He had changed so much in such a short time. “It’s funny”, he said. “I feel like I’m not really me anymore. But at the same time, I am me. I Can’t Put a Name on this feeling of mine.”

Chapter XIIII

He continued on his path, and came to an inn. In return for a few of his old tricks to entertain the innkeeper’s guests, he was given food and shelter for the night. And that night, he had a dream. He dreamt an angel came to visit him. “I am your guardian angel”, she said to him in his dream. “My name is Temperance. Whenever you need me, call out for me and I will give you peace.”

“ What a beautiful dream”, sighed the Bateleur when he woke up.

Chapter XV

He washed and went down to the dining hall for breakfast. At his table was a rather evil looking man. The man said, “I saw your tricks last night. If you join up with me, I can take you to places where we can become rich! I will teach you some tricks that will make people want to give us all their money! I will teach you tricks that will give you power over people! What do you say?”

The Bateleur thought that it would be nice to be rich. But something about that man made him think of The Devil. And he remembered what the Popess told him so long ago: “If your heart says go right, go right. If it says go left, go left”. He thought of The Temperance who had visited him in his dreams to talk about peace, and he knew that with this Devil man he would never find peace.

“ No thank you”, he said politely to the Devil man, and he got up from the table and left the inn.

Chapter XVI

The Bateleur was not happy. He no longer knew what he was travelling for. He no longer found his journey exciting. He felt that it had no purpose. He said to himself “What is my place in the world? Who cares about me? No-one misses me. No-one cares if I live or die. If I do tricks, people clap and then forget about me. No-one needs me.”

He felt suddenly that his past life had been thrown down from a high Tower and had shattered into a thousand pieces. He walked lonely down the highway and when at last night fell, he sat down wearily under a tree and waited for sleep to come. It was a stormy night, and the rain fell on his face.

Chapter XVII

Do you remember the last time The Bateleur was worried? Yes, that’s right! He saw that beautiful sunset. Now the night had fallen, and the sun had already set. But just before he shut his eyes, the clouds opened in the sky, and there shining brightly was a Star. He looked at this Star and it twinkled at him, and it seemed to say to him: “My friend, be of good cheer. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?” The Bateleur gave a little smile, the rain stopped falling and he fell asleep feeling much happier.

Chapter XVIII

Just before dawn, he woke up. His Star had gone, but there was the Moon looking down at him. The Moon looked so old, like an ancient, beautiful mother. He thought “The world is mysterious. It’s like the Moon. Who has ever seen the other side of the Moon? There are secrets to be discovered. Let me continue my journey and see what these secrets can teach me.”

Chapter XVIIII

When morning came, the Sun shone in all its glory. It dried The Bateleur’s wet clothes, it warmed his body. He lay on the grass, and listened to the birds singing, the bees humming. He watched the butterflies flit past. He saw a little green frog hopping by on his way to the nearby pond. A squirrel scurried up a tree.

Chapters XX and XXI

And suddenly, like a trumpet from the heavens calling people triumphantly to make a final Judgement on their life, the Bateleur realised that he was part of the World. The World was no longer outside of him, but in his heart. He was the World, just like the grass, the birds, the bees, the butterflies, the frog and the squirrel.

Epilogue

And the Bateleur was free. And freedom was good. He could be want he wanted to. A genius or a Fool.

And he was content.

And that is the end of the story. Now close your little eyes and go to sleep.

Diana Sobolewska is known for her love and passion for the Tarot de Marseille. She is also the founder of the Tarot Study Forum.

This story first appeared on Aeclectic Tarot, reproduced with author’s kind permission.

The highly recommended Jean Noblet Tarot Deck reproduction by Jean-Claude Flornoy used in this article is available at www.letarot.com