It's an interesting digression and educational! I had absolutely no idea there was ever a French Albano Waite. The vintage Albano Waite I own is my favourite deck of ALL time, it's truly psychedelic! The colours are vastly superior to the current version.
My impression is that France seems to get short thrift from US Games. I wonder if that is because the Marseille tradition is predominant over there?
My impression is that France seems to get short thrift from US Games. I wonder if that is because the Marseille tradition is predominant over there?
I had not thought about it from that angle, but I think you are right, that is probably one reason. Divination tarot in general is not as well known in France as it is in english speaking countries (here, the first thing that comes to mind when you say "tarot" is the name of the game of cards), and when it is, the Marseille deck comes first.
The RWS system is not as well known. And, alas, there are not that many books in french about learning the RWS system. There are some, but the choice is very narrow when you compare it to the huge amount of tarot books available in english ! So it's a good thing for me that I can read english, and probably one of the reasons why I am so much into tarot in the first place. If I had had to rely on ressources available in french only, I would probably not be where I am, tarot wise.
It is also a vicious circle I suspect : the less french people are aware of the RWS, the less books and decks will be printed in french... and the less french people will be aware of RWS...
My collection is probably made of 90% of decks in english.
It does not bother me to have a deck with english titles, and I am also OK with titles in other languages (actually I am rather fond of that. Titles in a foreign language that I do not speak, are a little bit more exotic for me.... so exctiting ! and I can usually understand which card I am looking at even if I dont speak the language) But, from time to time, it is just cool to have a deck in french. It makes the deck a little more special to me, and also, it enables my sitters to understand what's written on the cards ! (not everybody here speaks english, far from it !)
You are right, US games is not very generous with french versions of their decks ! Apparently, they used to be (the Morgan Greer I have in french was printed by Carta Mundi under license of USG, same for my french Albano Waite) But they stopped printing these decks in french, so I suppose the french market was not interesting enough.
There are a couple other decks that can be found in french versions, from other publishers : I know that there is a french version for Shadowscapes, for Moore's Steapunk tarot, and I think also for the Tarot of Hidden Realms and for Mystic Faeries... probably others too.
But, I do not own these. I have the english version of the Steampunk and of the Mystic Faeries because there availability is easier through the net than anything else, in the small city where I live, and as most of my tarot reading and ressources are in english, when I come accross the name of a deck, it is usually first in english ! I realised afterwards that there were french versions for the Steampunk and Mystic faeries... but too late.
I do have the Druidcraft in french though (Tarot des Druides) and as it is one of my favourites, it makes up for the others I missed !
This is an interesting subject and I might open a thread about it later, because I feel bad about crowding your Morgan Greer thread with my babbles of languages versions of decks
But thank you for this discussion because it has given me a lot to think about !