The Victorian Romantic Tarot: It's Here!!

Well, I do still like the foot-snake comparison. After all, it is pointed and green and emerging from a sort of cave, a snake slithering among the roses. Wonderful thing about these cards and what makes them powerful tools for reading is each element is wonderfully polysemic. I mean roses are love, Christ etc, but also passion, female genitalia, In le Roman de la Rose of course the rose, is not only the purety and virginity of the maiden entrapped within a great castle, but also the lure which ensnares the hero into the castle....sort of like an apple in a garden.

Same with the pearls, they are jewels.. but they are also pearls... symbols of treasure? or symbols of purity?

And the treasure...we could ask ... is it her private jewel box? or was it offered by a tempter (offered by the Devil as we said before), is is plunder? the symol of riches gleaned over the heads of starving toothless peasents? is the open casket symbolic of sexual violation?

I find it interesting in this card that the figure is a woman - rather than the traditional constipated man, sitting on a sort of toilet like throne. That she is a woman brings in a whole new layer of interpretive possibilities.

I hope that everytime I draw the card for a new victim, I will see the it differently. (The Tarot of Prague is brilliant for that).

My decks came today-the Standard and the Gold Edition. And The Star bag. Oh, joy ! These are so beautiful. I knew they would be because I'd seen some of the scans, but to hold them in my little paws and see all the details, this is a special experience.

I think they'll be marvellous to read with, too.

Thank you, Karen and Alex. A BIG thank you I had all sorts of feelings and thoughts running through my head as I slowly sifted through the cards-and laid out the Major Arcana-but those feelings and thoughts will wait. Suffice to say, this is a magnificent achievement.

One of the things I like in the book is the section Karen has devoted to the creators of these engravings. Most of these people are hardly heard of now, and I suspect some of them were never well-known even in their lifetime, but look at what they made !

Oh my gosh. It was a very good day today, which actually started yesterday when I received Major Tom's Tarot Calendar at work. Upon arriving at home I find a note in my mailbox to pick up a package at the post office -- Arnell Ando's Lucky Pack Tarot and Leslie Cochran's Dreamythology Tarot. On my way home I stop at my apartment building's office to find...The Victorian Romantic Tarot - Gold Edition! What a day!

I have to say that the gold is just mesmerizing. I find it most stunning when it's in the hair of the various ladies depicted in the cards. In my deck the Moon and the Sun have the most shimmer in them. I just sit and look at the cards, tilting them back and forth to see the shine!

As far as the cards themselves go, it's interesting how some cards have a very strong mental impact (the Devil and Wheel of Fortune really make me think) while others are very emotionally gripping (the 10 of Swords and the Tower are so sad!) And then the cleverness of some just makes me giddy. The Four of Cups! Everyone's toasting except the tuxedoed gentleman (who looks as if he'd rather be anywhere else), whose glass is very, very empty. I love it! Also: Do NOT mess with the Queen of Swords. She scares me! (But in a really good way! )

Peace,

Melvis

Melvis said:

Everyone's toasting except the tuxedoed gentleman (who looks as if he'd rather be anywhere else), whose glass is very, very empty. I love it! Also: Do NOT mess with the Queen of Swords. She scares me! (But in a really good way! )

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Sounds like a GREAT day Melvis! The painting is by John Collier and it's almost certainly a self-portrait. Titled, rich, a talented and well-connected Pre-Raphaelite painter he seems to have been the man who had everything.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Collier_(artist)

But one looks at this picture and wonders how much happiness it brought him. I find it very haunting. By the way, his first wife died partly as a result of severe depression. I think there was a sadness hanging over Collier, and this picture really shows it.

IT'S HERE!!!!

it'shereit'shereit'shereit'shereit'shereit'shere

My Victorian Romantic Gold #490, journal, bookmarks, companion book and Moon bag are here!

It is so beautiful! One of their finest yet. Yet, more wistful a feel than I'd expected. Check out that Six of Cups. Really tugs at the heartstrings for me.

Weather's too dull for checking out the gold in sunlight, yet not dark enough for candlelight. I've been turning the cards this way and that in the dying sunset, and longing for a fireplace, a bowl of hot chocolate and a winter storm raging outside. That I think would bring out the best in this deck.

Will it replace my beloved Prague? No. Apples and oranges. Of course it has the same magic and the same superior craftsmanship, but I think this is a deck that will inhabit a special place of its own. Certain moods, readings or situations will call for the VR, others for the Prague, I think.

Bravo, Karen and Alex and everyone else involved in this deck. Bravo! A stunner. And I already have Tarot-type ideas for that journal!

QueenofPentacles said:

Bravo, Karen and Alex and everyone else involved in this deck. Bravo! A stunner. And I already have Tarot-type ideas for that journal!

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Here - here! I have plans for that journal too! More to say tomorrow after an evening with this beauty!

I keep a regular journal anyway, so will be using this VR one for a different purpose-a scrapbook, a receptacle of all things Victorian : fine art, illustrations, poems, etc. etc. Interspersed with downloads of these Tarot images. Which ones are my favourites ? Don't get me started. . .

I get the feeling these journals, Karen and Alex, will unleash a whole wave of creativity among At-ers and all others fortunate enough to encounter the Gold Edition

rosyelf said:

I get the feeling these journals, Karen and Alex, will unleash a whole wave of creativity among At-ers and all others fortunate enough to encounter the Gold Edition

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Oh, we would LOVE to unleash even a ripple (in bigger world terms) of creativity. It makes the whole thing so much fun.

I must get some more high-res pictures up.

We loved making the journal by the way. I think it really is something we'll do more of. With some printed inner pictures too perhaps? You see - ripples of creativity are beginning already But seriously, I am getting quite a buzz from doing the bags, journals and so on. I owe a big thanks to people here who kept asking for bags!

VR Journal

Karen,I know I've asked you this before but will the VR journal ever be available on it's own?
Robin

No, I'm afraid it's a "special" for the Gold edition. However, we are seriously thinking about doing some journals for the New Year. They are such good fun to do and very satisfying. Someone has already asked us to develop "Bohemian Cats" journals (not tarot specific, but rather the images reworked for a journal) so we are wondering about maybe a Victorian (again, not specifically tarot-related though) journal/notebook - that could be so nice I think. But it's really no further than an idea for now.