About this item
- The Poet Tarot is a 70-card deck created by and for poets, writers and artists. It features 30 well-known poets on its
- major arcana and court cards, and has themed minor arcana suits of Quills (Wands), Muses (Cups), Mentors (Swords),
- and Letterpresses (Pentacles). Published and available now after a successful Kickstarter campaign.
Specifications
Name
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Poet Tarot
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Creators
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Kelli Russell Agodon ,
Annette Spaulding-Convy
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Publisher
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Total Recall Press 2014
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Deck Type
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Tarot Deck
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Cards
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70
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Major Arcana
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22
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Minor Arcana
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48
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Court Cards
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Queen, King
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Card Language
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English
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Card Back
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Reversible
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Companion Material
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80-page companion guidebook.
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Extra Info
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The deck has 70 cards as there are only two court cards in each suit (Queen and King).
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Reviews
just made its debut at the 2014 AWP Conference in
Seattle. It was created by Kelli Russell Agodon, who is
herself a writer, editor, and poet, and Annette
Spaulding-Convy, also a poet. There may be some debate as to
whether the Poet Tarot is a tarot deck or whether it is an
oracle deck, but either way, it’s a must-have for any
poet or writer and strong recommended for any tarot
professionals who frequently read for poets and writers.
Though it is referred to as a tarot deck, I tend to see
it more as an oracle deck. First, it has only 70
cards, not the traditional 78. The creators of the Poet
Tarot decided to omit the Pages/Knaves and
Knights/Princes. Instead, each suit in the Minors contains only 2
court cards, a Queen and a King, and they each
correspond with a poet, much like the Poets (i.e., Majors)
section. The court cards pretty much become an extension of
the Majors and based on the guidebook, seem to be
interpreted in much the same style as the Poets/Majors
section. Also, it should be noted that the average tarot
practitioner without a master’s degree in English Literature
will have to rely heavily on the accompanying Guidebook
for divination. In that sense, the divination method
becomes bibliomancy, not cartomancy exactly.
The deck
dimensions are about 2.75 x 4.75 inches, which for me is the
perfect size to shuffle with. They’re very snug in the
hands. The guidebook is 5 x 8 inches and while having
different size deck and guidebook would not bother me
ordinarily, I can’t imagine using the Poet Tarot deck without
the guidebook, and so for that, if both were the same
size, I could put both in the same pretty cedar box and
keep them together on my writing desk, no problem. Due
to the specific nature and purpose of this deck, it
would just make more sense to have the guidebook be the
same size as the cards, with the intention that the two
will always accompany one another.
The art of the deck
is in a digital collage form that blends Victorian
art and imagery with poet busts in a wholly
contemporary style. It’s really breathtaking to look through
and has a natural appeal to most 21st century writer
sensibilities. They’re borderless like many contemporary decks
today, and the borderless design suits the deck well.
Once you hold this deck, you’ll know that every aspect
of it was designed for the writer in mind. I just
want this deck (and its guidebook) in an ornate wood
box in the corner of my writing desk next to Strunk &
White.
The cards are subdivided into the Poets (Major
Arcana) and the Suits. The Suits are Quills, Muses,
Mentors, and Letterpresses, corresponding with Wands, Cups,
Swords, and Pentacles respectively. The four suits
represent the four stages of the creative writing process:
Quills for creation, Muses for inspiration, Mentors for
revision, and Letterpresses for completion. I really love
the thoughtful way Agodon and Spaulding-Convy have
designed the Poet Tarot deck.
There’s something Marseille
about the deck, though not exactly. For example, the
Three of Quills is about creative expansion through
travel, so it would seem to follow the western
numerological attributions of the number 3, plus taking into
account the dignity (i.e., elemental correspondence) of
the suit. Recall that Quills here is all about the
creation and writing process.
Now, had we tried to impose
a Rider-Waite tradition of interpretation onto the
Three of Quills (i.e., Three of Wands), it doesn’t
quite work as well as applying the Marseille system.
Yet
of course there is still some overlap with the
Rider-Waite. The Eight of Quills according to the Poet Tarot
guidebook is about focusing on one project at a time rather
than work in a scattered fashion on too many, and never
finishing any. (Great advice, by the way.) It does resonate
with the Rider-Waite tradition.
I’m also not sure
whether the cards are intended to be read with reversals.
Sometimes I like to think the card backs will give some
indication. Reversible card backs lend themselves better to
reading with reversals and when I use a deck that does not
have a reversible card back, I may just read all the
cards by their essence, and thus do not observe
reversals. Here in the Poet Tarot, you have the reversible
card backs (love the illustration, by the way) but no
instruction in the guidebook about reading with
reversals.
The guidebook for the Poet Tarot contains more
information than most little white books (LWBs). At the
end there is a section on how to use the cards,
including daily and weekly card draws to use in conjunction
with the progress of a creative project. I really like
the idea here and leaving the card(s) drawn out
somewhere prominent while you write to inspire and motivate
you. The cards can also be used with a writing group or
workshop, and that instruction was fascinating to me. I
never thought of using tarot that way. Then there are
several simple spreads to work with.
While the 22 keys
of the Major Arcana in the Poet Tarot are certainly
inspired by the 22 keys in the traditional tarot deck, the
Poet Tarot’s Majors do take on a life of their own and
have become their own unique divination system. As
such, even without prior knowledge of tarot traditions,
the deck can be used as a muse for prompting creative
writing. One method suggested in the Guidebook is to draw
cards from the Minors and let the symbols and imagery of
the cards inspire a detail in the creative work in
question. I have found that method to work effectively and
the imagery on the Poet Tarot do help retrieve
information from the subconscious or subterranean planes of
the mind. Poets and writers would do well to have this
deck on their writing desks and tarot professionals who
frequently read for poets, writers, and artists of all walks
should definitely have this deck handy.
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