I was hoping to get some feedback from those who have a strong negative reaction to WS Queen of Swords. Is it because you associate the card with a particular person? Is it the art, the meaning... something else?
Hi Sentient
While I do not have a strong negative reaction to the RWS Queen of Swords, I understand this response to this card. It is almost an "archetypical" response in some ways. The other Queens do not evoke this response; the Q Cups is unconditional love, the Q Pentacles is hearth and home, and the Q of Wands could be your dream woman (and in my humble opinion a bit of a tart, but then I have trouble with the Q of Wands). These three Queens have remained within the expected behaviours for a Queen and represent the sister/daughter model of the Empress. But the Queen of Swords has dared to step away from the Empress model and take on an atypical powerful role normally thought of belonging to a King.
The Q of Swords beckons you forward with her left hand at the same time holding her sword upright in her right hand. What is going to happen, will she stab or cut you ? decapitate you ? or hear you out ? This is an intimating image.
Dr. Helen Castor has an interesting series, which for me speaks directly to the Q of Swords, called "She-Wolves - England's Early Queens". The term She-wolf has the negative connotation of a wounded, bitter, angry, predatory woman. This series talks about women who challenged early British male authority and tried to rule in their own right and were denigrated with the term She-Wolves. Her first example was Matilda. Matilda was the blood heir to the throne, designated by her father but still she had to win her crown through battle. After defeating her male cousin, when she tried to rule, the lords revolted, claiming that she was "unnatural" because she did not demonstrate the reticent qualities of a woman of her time but instead demonstrated the qualities of a ruling monarch.
Perhaps the Q of Swords is challenging the K of Swords like another "She-Wolf" in this series, Eleanor of Aquitaine, who did challenge her husband Henry II (son of the above mentioned Matilda). Of note is that Eleanor was richer in her own right than her husband, more politically astute than her husband and therefore, had she not been a woman in her time, would have been considered by all to be more powerful than her husband.
I see the Q of Swords as possibly being more powerful than her husband the King of Swords and as the rouge daughter/sister of the Empress and clearly as an anomaly amongst the Queens. As Dr. Castor said the She-Wolves show us just how far we have come and how little things have changed. I think that we can feel uncomfortable with the Queen archetype stripped of her nurturing behaviours and taking on what are perceived as King behaviours.