Tarot Decks

I don't actually have a lot I want to say right now on the subject. Maybe I'll write more later.

My usual deck, the one I'm most familiar with, is the Universal Waite deck, sold by U.S. Games. It's a recoloring of the Rider Waite deck using the original black and white drawings by Pamela Colman Smith. The colors are shaded and are softer than the Rider deck, which has solid colors throughout. Some people like the coloring of the Rider deck, but I do not. I have a Rider deck, though, for completeness.

Aside from that, I also have the Shining Woman Tarot, the Aquarian Tarot, Crowley's Thoth deck, the Tarot of the Old Path, the Witches Tarot (from Llewellyn. There's another deck with that name), the Robin Wood Tarot, and the Voyager Tarot. There's a Daughters of the Moon Tarot in the house, but it's not mine. Somehow I've never managed to get a Motherpeace deck. I've looked it over many times, but it doesn't appeal to me for some reason.

I like the collage images in the Voyager deck. I like the depth of psychological symbols in the Shining Woman deck. They both have funky suits, though, and I'm more comfortable with the traditional ones. With the exception of the Daughters of the Moon, they are all derived from Waite's deck.

I guess that since the early twentieth century it's been impossible to consider tarot without considering the effect of Arthur Edward Waite and Pamela Colman Smith. There are very few decks out there that aren't pretty much rehashings of Rider Waite with a few cards' symbolisms changed a bit.

On the other hand, Ellen Cannon Reed has informed me that she was not influenced by Waite in her Witches Tarot, and upon looking again, I see that she's using the European school interpretations rather than the English school. So I'm wrong.

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This file was modified Wednesday, 15-Dec-2004 12:58:11 PST