Much as this is a wonderful addition to the tarot canon, and I shall certainly buy it when it comes out, I keep thinking that surely it would have been more interesting to actually try and restore the deck to how the actual drawings might have been.
OK, I know we don´t have the original drawings (weren´t they destroyed in the War?), but I find myself thinking that whether it is a Pam A or a Pam B is kind of neither here nor there (did I say something controversial?)
I mean, even the most casual observer can see that Pixie´s non-tarot drawings have a lightness of line and delicacy that no editions of the RWS have ever managed to capture. Suggests to me that the early editions of the RWS looked the way they did because of limited printing expertise/ technology available in 1909 (not because of Pixie´s artwork). Suggests to me that her original drawings would have had a much finer line. Altogther less "black" on the images where lines bleed and blotch (I mean, look at the King of Pentacles, but all cards have it to some extent; so many indistinguishable details)
It would have been interesting to try and get to the heart of how the original artwork might have looked, eliminating printers blotches and the "bleeding" lines. I know none of us know how the original would have looked, but that - of course - is the work of a skilled restorer. A Pam A or Pam B will maintian that 1900 "heaviness"
Just something that comes to mind... though I am thrilled too see this edition. But the discrepancy betwen her non-tarot "line" and the "line" on the RWS images bothers me (but only slightly). It has an unmistakable 1900 picture book blotchiness which a Pam A or a Pam B will merely reproduce...
