Sweet Twilight - The Lovers

[Aerin]

This is such a beautiful, tender card. They are in their own little world (even though it looks a bit precarious - I wouldn't want to stand up on it!).

The LWB says that they fear their world may disappear like a dream.

"Love is more than feelings for each other"

There's a moon tangled in one of the plants - some illusion there? And the sun shines like innocence in the sky. The clouds now - love isn't always easy. These look pretty benign though.

[Alan Ross]

The clouds now - love isn't always easy. These look pretty benign though.

I would agree that these are very benign clouds. They seem to my eye to form a partly off-scene heart. The line of clouds left and right descending toward the lovers and the clouds curving inward on the bottom right corner suggest this to me. This suggestion is also helped by the shape of the turf covered rock the lovers are kneeling on, which tapers inward like the bottom half of a heart.

Alan

[Aerin]

Ah!

Thank you Alan.

I'd spotted the island heart but not the clouds. If you see what I mean :)

[Hemera]

"Love is more than feelings for each other"
That´s the problem of this card.. Love *should*be more.
I don´t see very much here apart from some watered down immature and inexperienced feeling-sort-of-thing. They are cute and innocent but to me that is not what a love card should be about. I´d like there to be the traditional (RWS) element of choice. But I could even live without that if there was a feel of something very deep and intense and mature (like in the Morgan-Greer lovers for example). These people look like very young teenagers making exciting discoveries but that´s about it.
This is probably one of the Majors in this deck that speaks the least to me.

[Curtis Penfold]

That´s the problem of this card.. Love *should*be more.
I don´t see very much here apart from some watered down immature and inexperienced feeling-sort-of-thing. They are cute and innocent but to me that is not what a love card should be about. I´d like there to be the traditional (RWS) element of choice. But I could even live without that if there was a feel of something very deep and intense and mature (like in the Morgan-Greer lovers for example). These people look like very young teenagers making exciting discoveries but that´s about it.
This is probably one of the Majors in this deck that speaks the least to me.

I don't know. Sure, the Lovers traditionally shows a mature relationship. It traditionally has either a minister or an angel or whatever making it final. But you know, just because you have an angel there doesn't mean it'll last forever. Heck, a lot of people believe their "in love" when within a year, they completely despise each other.

I would say a reinterpretation of this card is appropriate. To me, the Lovers isn't about mature commitment. It's just about that feeling, love, that speaks to us. But it's not that feeling, it's not that angel, it's not that minister that's going to make this love complete. It's hard work, and this card should make you think: does that couple have what it takes to work together?

This is just how I see the card, although I can definitelly see where you're coming from. (Maybe I'm just cynical when it comes to love).

[Alan Ross]

I don´t see very much here apart from some watered down immature and inexperienced feeling-sort-of-thing. They are cute and innocent but to me that is not what a love card should be about. I´d like there to be the traditional (RWS) element of choice. But I could even live without that if there was a feel of something very deep and intense and mature (like in the Morgan-Greer lovers for example). These people look like very young teenagers making exciting discoveries but that´s about it.
This is probably one of the Majors in this deck that speaks the least to me.

I rather like this version. It's sweet and it's consistent with the youthful spirit of the deck. Yes, these lovers have their heads in the clouds, but the first bite of love is often like that, even for those of us who have been bitten many times.

It's true that there is no element of choice here. In that respect, this deck takes its inspiration for The Lovers from the RWS, which also empasizes innocent love rather than choice. (The significance of choice, generally between virtue and vice, actually derives from older historical decks, such as the Tarot de Marseille.) As Waite states in his "Pictorial Key to the Tarot":

"The figures suggest youth, virginity, innocence and love before it is contaminated by gross material desire... This is in all simplicity the card of human love, here exhibited as part of the way, the truth and the life. It replaces, by recourse to first principles, the old card of marriage, which I have described previously, and the later follies which depicted man between vice and virtue."

Alan

[Hemera]

Thank you Alan and Curtis Penfold. I see what you mean. And yes, sorry, I didn´t realise that the choice element was not in the RWS but in even earlier versions. I quite like the choice thing though..

Nevertheless.. I still stubbornly say that this card lacks depth. It is true that most of the cards in this deck have youthful innocence. But in most cases there is also a mysterious wisdom of a profound kind, even in cards where there are just children. (10 of swords comes to mind here)
I´m probably too old and cynical or something:bugeyed: })
I just don´t seem to get anything out of this card beyond the feeling that these young people are making exciting physical discoveries :P

[Alan Ross]

Thank you Alan and Curtis Penfold. I see what you mean. And yes, sorry, I didn´t realise that the choice element was not in the RWS but in even earlier versions. I quite like the choice thing though..

I like the choice thing, too. The LS Secret Tarot is one of my favorite reading decks. It has a wonderful Lovers card that you can see here:

http://********.multiply.com/photos/album/91/Secret#photo=13.jpg

Now that is what I call choice!


Nevertheless.. I still stubbornly say that this card lacks depth. It is true that most of the cards in this deck have youthful innocence. But in most cases there is also a mysterious wisdom of a profound kind, even in cards where there are just children. (10 of swords comes to mind here)
I´m probably too old and cynical or something:bugeyed: })
I just don´t seem to get anything out of this card beyond the feeling that these young people are making exciting physical discoveries :P

I wouldn't say that your criticism is completely unfounded. I've noticed that this deck, more than most I've worked with, evokes meaning through mood more than symbolism. If the sort of puppy love that Sweet Twilight's Lovers evokes is not something you relate to then it's understandable that the card won't work for you. Your perception that the card is shallow may be a reflection of the belief that the puppy love the card represents is shallow. That you're able to get more out of the Morgan Greer's Lovers, with its more mature couple, makes perfect sense.

Alan

[RiccardoLS]

I've noticed that this deck, more than most I've worked with, evokes meaning through mood more than symbolism.

Most LS decks (at least among the one I like) try to excape symbolism, and moving to the evocative gestalt feeling.
Symbols are easier... but it's not the only way.

If the sort of puppy love that Sweet Twilight's Lovers evokes is not something you relate to then it's understandable that the card won't work for you. Your perception that the card is shallow may be a reflection of the belief that the puppy love the card represents is shallow.

A very interesting observation.
Not just regarding this specific case, but in much wider sense.

***********

Getting back to the card, I think a part of it is also about *making love*
You know... sex. Maybe first time sex (at least first time together).
"Love is not just feelings" fits.

I wrote a review on the movie Wall-E, last year. I felt it to be the most beautiful love story I had seen in a while. The fact tat Wally and Eve are robot prevents sex to enter the story and let so much more space to "love". I mean... too often, in movies, the symbol for storytelling love is sex.
In this card, I feel the opposite. We talk too much about love as something so damn high, haughty and pure. It is LOVE, not just love.

In a way, I feel like this love is much simpler. Humbler. Natural and spontaneous. Even akward.
Kissing and undressing in their own world, slowly... savouring the love.

I think I like it.

[Curtis Penfold]

I wrote a review on the movie Wall-E, last year. I felt it to be the most beautiful love story I had seen in a while. The fact tat Wally and Eve are robot prevents sex to enter the story and let so much more space to "love". I mean... too often, in movies, the symbol for storytelling love is sex.

I just wanted to say that I LOVE Wall-E. Like, really love it.

Yeah, I agree that Wall-E can talk about love on a different level, because it lacks sex.

However, with the images on this card, I really don't see that, that level of love. I think this card is all about that initial FEELING of connection, which is what I feel this card has always been about.

"Love is not just feelings" is really saying, in my opinion, "How far do you think this is going to go?"

C.S. Lewis wrote in the "Four Loves" that Eros whispers to us echos of the marvelous things that CAN develop, if we put effort into it. We can't assume that butterflies in our stomachs are going to lead us through.

This is, what I thought, was the philosophy of this card.

[Aerin]

I'm more with Curtis here. I remember that feeling when the rest of he world slips away and there is only the two of you. This can lead to something far, far deeper - at this stage it is about the connection and communication on a level that is almost beyond awareness.

Pure lust isn't like that: it's more an animal hunger and I don't see that in this card.

I think the choice comes in as - do you let the feelings and communication deepen and risk being hurt once your heart is wide open, or do you shut things down in case your partner doesn't feel the same way and for them it IS just lust.

[RiccardoLS]

I was not talking about pure lust, I think.
Should we really consider the idea of physical sex to be just that?

[Aerin]

Hi Ric - no I don't think you were.

I think that you can have lust without love (which is where for me the animal hunger on its own would come in), I see this card as having both though. Physical and emotional love. I don't see at as shallow in any way.

[Sar]

Not shallow at all.
These two has taken a risk, made a little island for themselves and discovers what love is all about.

[Grizabella]

These Lovers look kind of androgynous almost. The naked one has broad shoulders and narrow hips like a man and the other figure is much more slight and we don't see breasts or even the hint of them. I like the way this is done because it could be two men, two women, or a man and a woman.

[septimus]

These Lovers look kind of androgynous almost. The naked one has broad shoulders and narrow hips like a man and the other figure is much more slight and we don't see breasts or even the hint of them. I like the way this is done because it could be two men, two women, or a man and a woman.

I disagree; the naked person is definitely a woman from the shape of her, the breasts and hips and her posture. The shoulders are a little mannish, but maybe she plays tennis.