Molly Bloom, card reader

Lleminawc

here's a little snippet from Molly Bloom's soliloquy at the end of Ulysses:

... hold on he was on the cards this morning when I laid out the deck union with a young stranger neither dark nor fair ... what was the 7th card after that the 10 of spades for a Journey by land then there was a letter on its way and scandals too the 3 queens and the 8 of diamonds for a rise in society yes wait it all came out and 2 red 8s for new garments ...

OK it's playing cards rather than Tarot but I imagine they were pretty rare in 1904 Dublin.

Dejavooo

Oh thank you s much for pointing that out. I had to read Molly Bloom's soliloquy for my English class, but i completely missed that part! Thats so interesting =)

brenmck

Lleminawc said:
OK it's playing cards rather than Tarot but I imagine they were pretty rare in 1904 Dublin.

Thanks so much for this - realizing that the venerable Mr. Joyce knew about the cards adds another dimension to him for me. Very interesting.

PS - I saw a filmed version of Ulysses many years ago - has anyone else seen it? It was shown in a campus art theatre, and I never heard of it again.

~B~

Umbrae

Lleminawc said:
OK it's playing cards rather than Tarot but I imagine they were pretty rare in 1904 Dublin.

Ya know WB Yeats was a member of the GD. I don't think divination (be it Tarot or Cartomancy) was rare at all in 1904.

Lleminawc

Umbrae said:
Ya know WB Yeats was a member of the GD.

Indeed he was, in fact according to Gertrude Moakley it was Yeats who gave Pamela Colman Smith the nickname of "Pixie". I've been wondering whether it could even have been Yeats who first introduced PCS to the Golden Dawn - they knew each other through the theatrical world, and she designed the sets for one of his plays.

Molly Bloom, card reader

Lleminawc

Dejavooo

brenmck

Umbrae

Lleminawc