We sometimes imagine that in order to read cards -- to divine the story expressed by symbols -- one needs to be a semiotician or an esotericist or perhaps even an intuitive. How helpless we feel in the presence of codified imagery with no key or clue to unlock its meaning or unfold its story. Yet a card ought to be as easy to approach as a sonata or a poem.
While divinatory or self-realization cards are typically studied from the standpoint of mythology and the archetypes of depth psychology, it's easiest to approach the coded imagery as allegorical. In other words, every symbol can be read as an analogy: X is like Y. Such correlations aren't meant to be cryptic or confusing but rather resonantly poetic. A metaphor is powerful because it suggests so much -- it's comprehensive, interesting, memorable, and triggers insights on several levels. Metaphor has been called the simplest way of proceeding from the known to the unknown via an almost unconscious flash of insight (Nisbett, R. & Ross, L., Human Inference, 1985, p. 4).
A great picture, like a good book or a grand symphony, is the bearer of a message. The artist's high mission is to compose that message -- to arrange, organize, and harmonize the various symbols -- in a way that will speak to us truthfully and strongly. Our mission is to interpret the message correctly and integrate it into the tapestry of life.
Some chief qualities enter into a good card image. A principal object usually rises at or near the center of the picture. Accessory objects may balance on either side, arranged so as to show a necessary connection of all parts to the whole. The proportion of light to shadow lends tone and texture. Yet it's not the inventory of a scene's minutiae that's important but rather the sum total as the eye sees it and the soul feels it and realizes it. It's not the superficial details that are important as much as the deeper implications. Real merit is never obtrusive -- like pearls, you must dive to find that which will enrich you.
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