Review of The Casanova Tarot
Although not a newly released deck, this is one that I came across whilst trying to spice up my tarot life; to be honest I was googling erotic tarot decks. Now, don’t look at me like that. As the proud owner of maybe a dozen decks, my husband accuses me of being a collector. My TABI mentor, when we met him, laughed at that notion… apparently a dozen decks does not a collector make! But I did realise that it was time to stop buying decks. Except of course ones which amuse him. Hence my search for something a little different. That’s my excuse.
The deck is based on the life of the great lover of the eighteenth century, Casanova, and depict romantic scenes from his home town of Vienna, use sensuality and eroticism to depict the relationships between individuals. The creators make an apology in the introduction of the Little White Book to those the might offend. In my opinion, anyone who might be offended by a little erotica shouldn’t be looking at this deck!
The presentation of the deck is nothing special… a normal cardboard box containing cards which are a decent quality, and a decent size. In fact, they are very comfortable to handle and easy to shuffle; the only drawback being that they are not reversible, since the images on the backs are of a cloaked male.
The imagery on these cards is fantastic. Very “Les Liaisons dangereuse”. An erotic deck, to say the least, these cards would be a fine starting point for the discussion of where do we draw the line between Art and Porn. In my opinion, these fall under Art…. Just. Now, I don’t always go through each new deck card by card, but doing so was an absolute necessity with this deck. Just over half of the cards contain a scene of sexual acts; most of the females depicted have their sizeable bosoms hanging out; and all of the males depicted are fully clothed.
My particular favourite is the 5 of Chalices, depicting a young man who has pulled down the pants of a nun. There is something about this card which makes me want to jump right in there and join in – and I’m as vanilla as they come! The LWB interprets this card as “Denial of previous choices, retracing one’s steps, awareness of a mistake, temporary loss” It also has a note, explaining that one of Casanova’s loves was indeed a nun.
I’m also supposed to talk a little bit about the symbology in the deck. Well, I don’t think it has any in the traditional sense – although the facial expressions are certainly worth looking deeper into. But perhaps I am just being so caught up in the whole new outlook I am seeing in this deck that I’m simply missing it. I heard that the cards are a reflection of RWS interpretation, but in most cases I’m not seeing it.
Now then, as amazing as this deck is, there is a down side. It was missing a card. Even though I ordered it as new from Amazon Prime, and it arrived complete in its cellophane. And yet it was missing a card from the deck, the Ace of Cups. We went through the deck twice, but it was most definitely missing. So the dilemma. Should we return it to Amazon and ask for a replacement? Well, the package was sealed, and what if the Ace of Cups was missing from the next deck too? So I emailed Lo Scarabeo on 5th May, and Jessica promptly replied that she would send the missing card. It arrived a month later, well after the return window had closed. I mention that, because I received the wrong card. Yes, it is the Ace of Cups, and yes, it is from the Casanova deck, but it is from a different edition, it would seem. Sadly, I have had no response from my subsequent emails explaining the situation.
But the deck is unusable as a tarot deck, and now the window for returning the deck via Amazon has closed. So fingers crossed that Lo Scarabeo do get back to me again with a solution!
However, there’s a bright side to everything, and the different card does give us the chance to compare two versions of the same deck. You see how my deck has black border, and no writing at all except the numbers. I much prefer that style. The simple, dark border is simply more classy than the white one for this style of deck. And the reverse… see how the replacement card is reversible? Well, I do prefer reversible cards on the whole, but the style of the replacement card seem wrong – it is out of synch with the artwork. Very odd indeed.
So my verdict?
This is an amazing deck, which I am absolutely in love with… if only I could use it!!!
Next month: Watch out for my Interview with this Deck!
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