 Sylvia Plath’s tarot deck is currently up for auction with Sotheby’s. “With my gypsy ancestress and my weird luck / And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack…”
These are famous words from Sylvia Plath’s poem, “Daddy,” one of her most famous ever. And Taroc is another name for the Tarot, as so many of you know already. Since Plath’s cards came up for auction at Sotheby’s, many people have been writing me about them. Yes, of course I want them. Ha ha. Doesn’t everyone who loves Plath. But already at over $7500 USD, and things will no doubt get fierce toward the end of the bidding (which stops on the 21st at 9:22 a.m. central time). Those who have read my book Fixed Stars Govern a Life: Decoding Sylvia Plath know that I have written that much of Plath’s poems were written based on imagery from the Rider-Waite tarot deck, different from this one. This tarot deck above is a Tarot de Marseille. Part of the reason I hold (and still hold) that the Rider-Waite imagery influenced Plath is because so much of it is clearly in the poems, most obviously in her “Poppies in October” which is the Rider-Waite Judgement (British spelling) card all over it. But throughout my book I make many references to Tarot de Marseille influence as well, occasionally with pictures, such as in my decoding of “Lady Lazarus” for The Lovers card. From Plath’s very first Ariel poem, “Morning Song,” the Marseille deck is named numerous times. But at the end of the day, no matter which deck you’re looking at, the tarot cards mean the same thing and FSGL remains relevant. I’m not convinced that Sylvia or Ted didn’t also have a Rider-Waite deck, by the way, as it is the more famous one. Tarot expert Mary Greer told me that in 1956 London, the Rider-Waite would likely have been the easiest deck to find. Regardless, there is also The Painted Caravan, the book Plath used to teach her tarot. This book has other versions of the cards, and explanations of their meanings, as well as illustrations, based on the Rider-Waite system. Academics have always rejected this tarot premise, and I am not surprised as they are notoriously atheistic, as well as probably ignorant to tarot and mysticism. (Also, who wants to learn that they might have missed key meanings all these years, or challenging ideas upon which their careers are based? Ouch! It makes sense to squash my work in that light) Some of the leading Plath “experts” are clearly ignorant to understanding poetry at all. Others teach it but have no understanding of creativity and certainly do not practice it. And then there are the scholars, like Dr. Ann Skea, who knows her mysticism yet she has written that she believes I am wrong. Skea told me herself that she had not read my work because she did not want to be influenced. Um, how can you critique work, or even challenge it, without reading it? This is reflective of much of the attitudes today: I am right, you are wrong, there is no debate and I’m not interested in hearing other sides. It’s disgusting, in my opinion. I abandoned trying to find acceptance in the Plath camp long ago. I have been much more warmly embraced by other creatives, academics outside the Plath field (especially those interested in mysticism), and of course, practitioners of mysticism themselves. I really need to get some more books out but have been too busy with my tarot these past few years. The Decoding books on “Lady Lazarus” and “Daddy” sell steadily, and I have sold a number of PDFs of my first, now sold-out and out-of-print book, Fixed Stars Govern a Life. But back to the auction: there is a terrible GoFundMe effort out there, to get a group of people to buy Plath’s tarot cards which they intend to break up and send one card to each funder. There are SO many reasons why this is wrong. From the spiritual point of view, I would never break up a tarot deck. From the materialistic point of view, this devalues the Plath-owned deck to virtually nothing. The pieces would no doubt be scattered and some would be cared for better than others. I told a client it reminds me of a story from the Bible, where wise King Solomon must decide which one of two women get a baby that they are both claiming to be their own. “This is easy,” says the King (I’m paraphrasing). “Grab a sword and split the baby down the middle so you can both share.” One woman panics and says no, no, please give him to the other woman. And Solomon knows then that the panicking woman is the true mother and gives her the child. My point being: these people in the GoFundMe don’t love Plath. They’re just fetishizing, like so many others out there, “for a piece of [her] hair or [her] clothes.” (“Lady Lazarus”). Whoever does win Plath’s tarot cards, I believe, inherits a duty to them. These are hopefully to be well-preserved in acid-free paper, probably in an air-tight (and certainly water-tight) space with no or limited light. Ideally, these cards should be made available to scholars for research. I pray that either Indiana University or Smith College can come up with the cash to make these part of their outstanding Plath collections. In the meantime, we’ll be watching and holding our collective breath… ACADEMIA, DR. ANN SKEA, KING SOLOMON, MARY GREER, PLATH, SYLVIA PLATH, SYLVIA PLATH'S TAROT CARDS, TAROC, TAROT, TAROT DE MARSEILLE
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