I received a PM that I might want to add my own perspective to this discussion. I'm the author of this book. My original purpose is well served by people questioning the sex/gender of a card.
I stated in my introduction under the heading "Terminology" that,
"In recognition of my theme of mirror images, I have chosen to use feminine pronouns as generic terms. . . . Perhaps by reflecting on this opposite maneuver you will begin to find a way to give birth to new understandings of what it means to be human" (p. 7).
I had discovered that far too many books—especially history, anthropology and sociology texts written before 1970—when using the so-called generic "he" to refer to humans, discussed things that just didn't make sense when talking about women. The generic he is all-too-often male-centric. This could only be discovered when changing all the hes to shes and realizing that the resulting statements were not true. Using 'he or she' or 's/he' all the time was awkward and I didn't like the generic 'they' when referring to an individual. Plus, there's the fact that 80% or more of my readers were women. Ultimately I hope we can transcend such things, but this book was written at a pivotal transitional time in which people were actively questioning such generic references and trying to find a way around them. I was being more explorative than politically-correct.
Although I examined Papus's organizational scheme for the Majors and used the RWS deck for a majority of the illustrations, this book is actually about what the cards reference in our own being rather than about what a particular tarot author/deck creator said about his or her deck.
In
Tarot Mirrors I wasn't just referencing the RWS deck, but tarot in its broadest sense. I proposed that the Fool card represents "your spirit-self" (p. 152)—which could be male or female.
On page 17, in a section headed "The Fool and Her Mirror," I wrote,
"The capricious nature of the mirror reminds you that the tarot, as with all games of life, is to be played. Taking it too seriously courts the danger of ego inflation or archetype identification."
Basically, I wanted people to question their assumptions.
Also, in the heading "The Fool and Her Mirror," I was pointing to a card illustrated on page 18 which I described as "A 15th century Austrian tarot deck [it was erroneously called tarot in my source] features a Fool card inscribed as 'Female joker/Looking at her grinning idiot's face in the mirror.'"
Thank you Chiska and Bernice for your largely correct suppositions:
I wonder if she is referring to the Fool as a reflection of herself?
The 'journey' is undertaken by individals, of all and any gender.
And Freddie, although this is not exactly the case, I see it as an option:
I wondered if this book was offering a revision of the Fool's journey as being primarily feminine.
And fyreflye you wrote:
Pixie draws someone, like herself, more sexually ambiguous.
Smith's biographer, Melinda Boyd-Parsons, has done a great job of tracking down photographs and drawings of the many female friends of Smith who acted in plays dressed as men (knights, etc.) and who probably served as models for many of the cards. One of the strengths of the RWS deck, to me, is the balance of male and female figures (count them) and the high number of androgynous-looking people.
Mostly I wanted to shake up people's assumptions and have them question and propose exactly the range of things that all of you have come up with here.
Thanks.
Mary K. Greer
