Bohemian Gothic: (2nd Edition) Nine of Cups

Thirteen

If you go here you can see a comparison of the 1st to 2nd edition: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3895197&id=53690237671&ref=fbx_album

In the 1st edition discussion of this card, everyone focused on what the man was drinking, and on the various containers about him. Relating back to the usual "tavern keeper" of the typical 9/Cups, we mused that he might well be an alchemist giving out brews and elixirs (the vials in the back are marked with alchemy symbols) and/or someone who might have poisoned others. The vibrant absinthe green of his drink suggests both a relaxing after work respite and, perhaps, a drink that might make him immune to poison. Thus he could, as in so many stories, share a poisoned drink with others but not die himself from it.

It was also, of course, suggested that there might be a Jekyll and Hyde brew going on here, but his relaxed pose, the elegance of that crystal goblet, doesn't really jive with someone who has made up a special potion and is drinking it down to transform (this is not a scientist in the lab with a test tube). Rather it jives with a man finished with his work and enjoying himself, very much in tune with the "enjoy yourself" message of the 9/Cups card.

With the new edition, however other things stand out. Like the fact that while the jars behind him are still alchemy jars, the ones on the table seem to be specimen jars. What stands out most particularly in this edition that did not stand out so much in the first edition...what IS that on the table? The strange, skinned creature in the first edition is barely noticeable. In the second, it can't be missed. It almost takes away the focus on the man and his green drink.

When I look at it, I see a thing with one huge yellow eye and a bulbous head; it seems both boneless and bloody. It might be a fetus, but I'm not so sure it's a human fetus (a baby Cathulu?). Did our alchemist get that milky green drink out of this thing, or did this thing have something that, added into the brew, made the green drink? Or has the man just been studying it and is now taking a break from his work?

His expression in the second edition seems more contemplative, as if he was turning over all he'd just learned from this thing in his head. The thing on the table certainly notches up this card, making it far more creepy and bizarre.
 

Maskelyne

I think this image has a foreboding feel to it. The man's posture doesn't look particularly relaxed to me, but rather a bit stiff and tentative, as though he has serious doubts about the green stuff in the glass. In particular, his unfocused stare suggests to me that either the liquid is already having some effect on him that he is struggling to understand, or that he is about to do something unfortunate and perhaps unnatural by drinking it.

It's an interesting contrast to the smugly satisfied squarely seated burgher with his nine chalices in the RWS card.
 

Thirteen

Maskelyne said:
I think this image has a foreboding feel to it. The man's posture doesn't look particularly relaxed to me, but rather a bit stiff and tentative, as though he has serious doubts about the green stuff in the glass.
I really don't think it's the green stuff in the glass that he has doubts about. If he did, his eyes would be down, gazing at it as he drank it, or lifting the glass to contemplate it before holding his breath and downing it.

And I really doubt it'd be in such a pretty goblet. If you're going to swallow down some awful elixir or medicine, you do it out of a bottle or some small shot glass.

I do agree that he has doubts, but I have a feeling they're about that thing on the table and either what he's done to get it, or what he's found out having examined it, or something else he's done that he's now not so sure he ought to have done.

While the green in the glass is very obvious, notable and, yes, important, there is so much going on in this image that it seems a pity to leave it out and concentrate only on that. Especially as he seems to be drinking it with ease even if his posture isn't entirely easy. Nothing, to me, suggests he has doubts about the drink whatever it is and whatever it may be doing to or for him.
 

Hippychick-Annie

Hannibal Lecter was a psychiatrist who became cannibalistic serial killer that would eat parts of his victims as well as keeping parts of their bodies for specimes..... As Hannibal says to Clarice ' I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti'

This character reminds me of the smug Hannibal, relaxing before dinner with his drink. I'm not sure if thats an eye or maybe a peice of bone or part of intestine in that horrible looking object on the table.
 

Orenda

Nine of Cups in Bohemian Gothic

Ok, what is that mass on the paper of his desk?! *exasperated*
 

Orenda

Thank you for the link! I did not think it was a mass or ream of paper, but a mass (likely dead) of flesh on the paper, which is defended by the bloodstain that appears on the sheet under this mass. What a bizarre conversation we're having, LOL
 

Orenda

I did ask about that mass (of flesh presumably) on the paper of his desk in a thread I started here, and the other thing I find fascinating is that most people refer to his drink as milky or dark "green liquid" (even in the review found here on Aeclectic) when my first and only thought was that it was prepared absinthe.

Anyone else think absinthe?
 

Sulis

Orenda said:
I did ask about that mass (of flesh presumably) on the paper of his desk in a thread I started here, and the other thing I find fascinating is that most people refer to his drink as milky or dark "green liquid" (even in the review found here on Aeclectic) when my first and only thought was that it was prepared absinthe.

Anyone else think absinthe?

Take a look at the thread for the 1st edition card: http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?p=2287417

There are 2 index threads at the top of this forum: http://www.tarotforum.net/forumdisplay.php?f=148

OrendaI've merged your thread with this existing one.

Sulis - Tarot Study Groups moderator
 

Thirteen

Orenda said:
Ok, what is that mass on the paper of his desk?! *exasperated*
LOL! Ah, yes, the thing on the table. In the first edition you hardly notice it and focus pretty much on the green drink. But in the 2nd edition....The BGT really made sure in the second edition that we noticed that, er, specimen.

Keep in mind that one of the important themes of the BGT is that of people trying to master, control, or delve into supernatural forces. And there's always the question: do they know what they're doing? Are they over confident in thinking they can survive this? What is driving them to do this?

Our 9/Cups gent is confident enough to have gotten his hands on that specimen in some way--might he think he knows more than he does about such things? That he knows enough about them to do what he means to do with them and survive? Why is he driven to go that far, rather than sticking with what he knows?

This is a deck where the suits--our intellect, our passions, our emotions, our hold on the material world--can lead us to some very creepy and dangerous places. To going a step too far in the wrong direction.