A Quick View of My New Tarot Books
Updates, expansions--and something I've had in the works for quite a while . . .
Hello—and welcome to Tarot | In Four Dimensions!
One purpose behind 4D was my desire to share books in progress. I’ve been writing a lot over the past three years—and one of my favorite projects has been revising/expanding/updating my first Tarot book, History, Mystery, and Lore.
The New-ish HML
I’m so pleased that many people have enjoyed the original book, both for reading and for reference. But it was never produced in a digital format, so those who would like to read it on a device, and/or easily search the text were out of luck.
So I set out to recreate the first part of the book in digital form.
It wasn’t long before I realized two things:
The dense text of the print book doesn’t lend itself well to reading on a screen.
There were many changes I wanted to make, in style and content.
The further I got into making revisions, the more I found myself rewriting the original. And as I went along, I discovered areas that I now see a little differently, as well as parts that needed more development.
The result of all this might be best described as a new-ish book that complements but does not replace the old-ish one. It’s a shorter, more streamlined, device-friendly read, suitable as a refresher for readers of the original.
Possibly more important . . . I think it’s perfect for those who’ve come to Tarot more recently, and (frankly) might not bother with an older book when so many new ones are available. Or who might not realize that Tarot history is both fascinating and important to understand.
I’ll have a lot more to say about the strategy for this book—but key for now is a status check. All the text is complete, but there’s more work to be done on illustrations and formatting.
So my plan is to publish each chapter here as it’s completed. You can download them and compile your own master copy if you like.
When all are done, I’ll put them together in an ebook, with a few other bits and bobs.
The same story is true for Part Two of HML—”Mystery.” I’ve already started applying the same process, but there’s significantly further to go.
As for Part Three, it would be an overwhelming task to reproduce all those annotated listings. So my view is that three years of posts on Exploration Project will stand in its stead as far as updates go.
Symbols and Synergies
This book was meant to be Volume 3 of my unintentional trilogy, following after Methods, Mastery, and More. But life happens!
A lot of the text was written years ago, and left waiting for fresh inspiration. When I came back to it last year, I realized there is a whole layer of information and ideas I want to add.
The original text goes card by card through the Major Arcana, and suit by suit, number by number through the Minor Arcana. Interspersed throughout are investigations into the deeper structures of the deck, as well as the introduction of related ideas.
The trump pages follow a common template that includes brief paragraphs on each of the following:
Historical Perspective
Divinatory Principles
Archetypal Themes
Mythic Associations
Illuminations
They are meant to offer a consistent quick-reference view.
By contrast, the interspersed pages are meant to reveal aspects of the Tarot that I think deserve more exploration. These pages make much use of information graphics that illuminate patterns and structures.
My plan is to publish two or three pages each week, until the whole thing is done!
That’s the big picture. If you decide to become a 4D subscriber, I’ll be very glad of the company as I complete these projects. And I truly feel they will be of interest to anyone who takes a serious interest in Tarot.
Warm regards, Cynthia