Which deck would you recommend to a writer?

[jolie_amethyst]

I would be curious to know how you intend to use the cards. I am a novelist and I have never gotten much use out of them compared to pure old-fashioned plotting tools.

There's a current thread in Oracles that Glass Owl started a few weeks back where several of us have been discussing off and on how we use both Tarot & Oracle decks as writing tools. There's also a number of writing related spreads that can be found in the index thread for the Spreads forum. Since how to use them isn't really a topic for the Decks board, probably best to discuss that either in Talking Tarot or joining in the existing discussion over in Oracles.

 

[feynrir]

I must agree with other posters in saying that most tarot decks will really help in drawing out a narrative.

The ones in my collection that I believe would be particularly rich:

Rider-Waite-Smith
Tarot of the Silicon Dawn
Enchanted Map Oracle <--Especially this one, for some reason.

Each of these decks has a particular flavor, but represents a very wide variety of situations and has a lot of strange juxtapositions in images (For example, faces on mountains in the Enchanted Map, and the many details and symbols in most RWS cards).

Silicon Dawn is the most SF, Enchanted Map has a cute side to it, and RWS is just cool.

 

[Aeric]

Italo Calvino's book The Castle of Crossed Destinies creates many colourful short tales out of lines of interconnected spreads of Visconti and Marseille cards. He uses the literal images on the cards rather than any meanings to explain the narratives since none of the characters can speak. You might want to read the book and try the same with a pack of those cards.

 

[nisaba]

I would be curious to know how you intend to use the cards. I am a novelist and I have never gotten much use out of them compared to pure old-fashioned plotting tools.

You can pull cards to flesh out the personality of a character, or to work out their backstory, or to guess at what path they'd take at a crucial moment, or whatever. If you've backed yourself into a corner (as a writer), pulling cards is a good way to restart the progression of your character development or plot again.

 

[Morwenna]

I think any deck would suit the purpose, if you read for the characters or situations the way you would for real-life ones. But some decks are more story-oriented in themselves; the Arcus Arcanum is a good example. Some decks have their own stories, like Cat People or Myers' Art Nouveau; those are less likely to generate a different story for a reader.

But I'm the kind who takes inspiration from the mere looks of things; I'll look at the figure on a card, any card, and something about it will give me a clue to the character; multiple cards from the same deck will give me relationships between the people. But I do the same thing with furnishings and house plans: what kind of people whould have stuff like this? And so it goes.

 

[Thoughtful]

I'm looking for inspiring decks with depth and many layers. Not for divination, but for story telling. Which is the first deck you are thinking of if you see the question?

I'm very curious.[/QUOTE

l think you would find the Roots of Asia tarot a very inspiring story teller, it does have many layers to it. It is a spiritually deep deck as well as being quite philosophical, truthful and honest. It certainly inspires my readings for others and helps to give no nonsense yet deep and meaningful answers.
Although the English version of this tarot is long out of print and highly sought after the German one is still available l believe.
Hope you find the tarot that works for you, would be interested to know which one you choose

 

[Thoughtful]

[/QUOTE=Gulliver;4067733]I'm looking for inspiring decks
with depth and many layers. Not for divination, but for story telling. Which is the first deck you are thinking of if you see the question? [/QUOTE]

l think you would find the Roots of Asia tarot a very inspiring story teller, it does have many layers to it. It is a spiritually deep deck as well as being quite philosophical, truthful and honest. It certainly inspires my readings for others and helps to give no nonsense yet deep and meaningful answers.
Although the English version of this tarot is long out of print and highly sought after the German one is still available l believe.
Hope you find the tarot that works for you, would be interested to know which one you choose

 

[Gulliver]

Wow, lots of suggestions! Thanks so much!!
I'll look at every single suggested deck to figure out, if it will work for me.

Honesty sounds good, Thoughtful! I'll let you know, which deck I'll choose. But it takes me a bit time to decide. I want to go with only one deck, it's easier for the beginning, I think.

 

[Owl Song]

I love using Tarot as part of my creative process when I'm writing. Most decks are great for getting your story mojo going. One of my favorites is the Tarot of the Hidden Realm, which just oozes story. I think it's because Jeffrey's artwork is so expressive. You get up close and personal with the portrait style paintings, which makes this deck feel particularly intimate to me.

 

[Gulliver]

Hope you find the tarot that works for you, would be interested to know which one you choose

Really, I don't know. So many possibilities. I'll try to use different decks I own already and then I'll see which one works best to have a direction. I was very surprised as I looked at the exercise group for TdM's, that because of the less limited images (re associations) these ones could be shortlisted. But therefor one has to have a particular orientation before working with a TdM I think. Oh, so many possibilities!

I will compare with images of in this thread listed suggestions of decks, if they are online available to see. Should I find THE ONE, I'll let you know.