For over two centuries the most important Tarot essays ever published remained written in their original 18th-century French, and thus unavailable to the vast majority of the world. A few English translations existed, but these were jealously held in private hands. Why "jealously"? Because ALL the occult keys to Tarot were contained in, in fact were invented in, these essays. Now, for the first time, these seminal texts, and their ever so important keys to Tarot, are available in an English translation. In addition, the reader is provided with numerous notes that explain the context and meaning of the densely symbolic text.
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By Eric Wagner
Aug 30, 2009
"Rhapsodies of the Bizarre" I used to think I knew a lot about tarot cards, before I started reading Jess Karlin. His ever growing knowledge about the subject amazes me. This book seems indispensible for anyone wanting to understand the tarot and/or the background of occult thinking over the past 200-odd years. I eagerly await Mr. Karlin's next book.
The essays here translated by Jess Karlin represent the origins of occult tarot. Although Tarot dates back to mid-fifteenth century Italy, Antoine Court de Gebelin and M. le Comte de Mellet were the first to perceive in the deck a philosophic lineage stretching back to the ancient Egyptians. Later, better-known occult writers such as A.E. Waite and Aleister Crowley would adopt their ideas in surprisingly exact detail. Karlin has for the first time presented a full English translation of these early essays, with comprehensive notes that situate the works within both a critical and a historical context. It is hard to overestimate the importance of this book. Anyone wishing to understand "what the Tarot cards mean" would be well advised to begin at the beginning; and here, for the first time, is the beginning. Ideas that Court de Gebelin and Comte de Mellet pioneered -- such as the notion that tarot symbolism was Egyptian in origin, or that the 22 trump cards should be related... More > to the 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet -- altered the development of tarot forever. The writing in _Rhapsodies_ is dryly engaging, and often very funny, and the translations are straightforward and readable.< Less
