Aleister Crowley (Thoth deck)

well, sansa, what do you think of the Thoth now? Have you gotten a copy yet? oh, a little off topic, but...

Happy Birthday!!! Maybe someone will get you this blasted deck as a gift and you can check it out first hand!

Helvetica said:

It was not published in his life-time.

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Really? So what happed? Did he die before it was finished? Just seems odd he put so much work into a deck that he never saw published.

Here's the information from the art link/ Crowley's life...

Just cutting and pasting from the link that I posted about the paintings that Lady Frieda Harris did:

1.Lady Frieda Harris

Lady Frieda Harris is renowned as the artist who executed Aleister Crowley's Thoth Tarot. This was, perhaps, Crowley's greated achievement. If Crowley fathered it, Harris was its mother. It was not an easy birth. She threw herself into the painting as the bombs of the Second World War fell, as predicted in the apocalyptic Third Chapter of their scared text, the Book of the Law. Those paintings selected for the final pack were exhibited twice in 1941. After Crowley's death Harris considered selling them, but it was not to be and in the end she bequeathed them to Gerald Yorke. He placed them with the Warburg Institute. However, Yorke retained several alternative versions of cards that were not included in the pack and some preliminary studies. These he sold through the Cecil Court bookdealer Harold Mortlake. They have been in private hands since and are now exhibited below available for sale. Also offered are original photographic prints from the 1940's, many signed by Frieda Harris


http://www.occultartgallery.com/occ...ris/harris.html

Just guessing:

The originals were paintings. I think the original project was conceived by Lady Frieda Harris to try to get the information out of Crowley's head to a material form of 78 that people could recognize in paintings.*

2. I heard or read Crowley died after a long life...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleister_Crowley.

I noticed the tabloid newspapers and those who were rather outraged at his behavior...'back in the day'...well, what I read doesn't strike me as anything more radical than a hippie or someone who founded communes in the 1960's and 1970's. Perhaps I'm wrong. I'm not certain Crowley would have been a hippie--perhaps a beatnik or an underground journalist and antiwar protester...

Happy reading!

Cerulean

*While the information speaks of a 'card pack,' I'm not certain when or how people decided to make the original paintings in card form. My guess is Sansa 's interest in the conversational thread is more about Crowley, so I would go the Thoth forum to read about the publishing history of the deck, etc.

Yes happy birthday sansa!

Yes - happy birthday

And get a copy of the deck. If you do find you hate it, you can always trade it off here ! But it is beautiful.....

Cerulean said:

I noticed the tabloid newspapers and those who were rather outraged at his behavior...'back in the day'...well, what I read doesn't strike me as anything more radical than a hippie or someone who founded communes in the 1960's and 1970's. Perhaps I'm wrong. I'm not certain Crowley would have been a hippie--perhaps a beatnik or an underground journalist and antiwar protester...

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I think Crowley saw himself as a rebel..but a gentleman rebel. In the end he got what he wanted.....eternal notoriety.

Happy Birthday Sansa!

In my experiance, my Thoth deck has been one of the most accurate decks that I own.

Lillie said:

Why should we take into account the creator of a tarot deck?
Or indeed any art or anything.

Who created the Marseilles deck?
Or the 1JJ Swiss deck?

I personally do not know anything about the creators of many of the decks I own.
Some of them I know a name, but nothing about the person, the ideas that name is connected too.

Who the Hell is Evan Show? What does he like/hate? No idea. I like the deck though.
Same for Palladini who did the Aquarian.
Same for Loads of decks, loads of people.
And I feel no urge, no need to find out.
I like the decks and that is enough.

Why is it always different when it's Crowley?

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I never said it was different just because it's crowley it's just an example...

Thanx for the happy birthdays! Oh I wish someone would give me something that I actually liked for my birthday!!! I would like to have gotten a tarot deck anyone of them really. But I got lots of like smelly stuff. I mean don't get me wrong smelling good is well good but it's not really my thing to be super high maintenence. So yeah again all the feedback is great but its hard to follow when there is so much of it. I like hearing all the different opinions is interesting to see who thinks what and why.