The road so far...

So over the past about year and a bit, I have completed 29 and a half Harry Potter tarot cards. I have written posts for most of them, some I haven't posted yet. The list of the ones I've completed are on the blog, but I thought it would be cool to get a group photo.

Because there are so many, it's hard to get all of them together. So I also took this photo:

and one of each one of them in their groups:

The Major Arcana:

Gryffindor:

Hufflepuff:

 Slytherin:

Ravenclaw:

Just thought it was pretty cool. I've done a lot, but I still have 48 and a half more cards left to do. :)

Major Arcana: XV Devil

Major Arcana: XV Devil

meaning of the card facing you: bondage, addiction, sexuality, materialism
meaning of the card facing away from you: detachment, breaking free, power reclaimed

It probably seems pretty obvious why I chose Voldemort to represent the Devil card, but I'm going to explain it anyway. I just want to clarify that I don't hink that Voldemort is the Devil or is supposed to represent him (and in this case I mean the Devil as is Lucifer, Satan, etc.). This card, is about the meanings that are above and what i will explain below, and nothing else. There is no religious meaning behind this that I know of.

Voldemort can represent addiction in the way he interacted with and used Horcruxes. It is said that most wizards, should they chose to split their soul in order to be immortal, usually stick with one or two Horcruxes, more then that would be excessive. Voldemort, however, decides to create seven apart from himself. Voldemort is not addicted to Horcruxes, but to power and the idea of unkillable.

Bondage is represented not in Voldemort but in his actions. He basically binds his followers to himself. The loyal ones are marked with a Dark Mark that he can use to summon them. They can never be free of this mark, even if they decide they do not want to follow him anymore. Along with that, Voldemort binds himself to Quirrell in order to grow stronger and get the Sorcerer's (Philosopher's) Stone that would help him be immortal. (Not completely sure if this counts as binding, but) Voldemort also using blood from Harry and his own father's remains to regain his body. This might have deepened the mind connection that Harry and he share.

I don't think, and don't want to think actually, about Voldemort's sexuality. In his school days at Hogwarts, though, he was said to be very charming, charming enough to get the Grey Lady to share her secret with him. Also, from the time he was in school to when he got older and more snakelike, Bellatrix Lestrange basically falls in love with him. It is more an obsession and power-hungry kind of love, but it is there.

Voldemort's power is reclaimed by Harry and the rest of the Light side. His most trusted servant, Severus Snape managed to find his own way to break free from Voldemort's clutches along with Draco Malfoy. They both ended up working (sometimes without meaning to) in a way that helped Harry out.

Major Arcana: IX Hermit

Major Arcana: IX Hermit

Meaning of the card facing you: soul-searching, being alone, introspection, inner guidance
Meaning of the card facing away from you: isolation, withdrawal, loneliness

Professor Severus Snape is the Hermit of this Tarot deck. There were a lot of cards that I matched Snape with. He fits with many different descriptions and meanings of cards, but after going through everything, I decided that Hermit fit Snape the best.

Most people don't see Snape past the idea that he is evil and a Death Eater. If you read the seventh book, it becomes clear that he was more like a double agent, leaning on the side of the Light. He passed them information while being Voldemort's right hand man. I personally find a lot more good than bad about him, but not everyone will agree with me.

Snape spent his life alone. He grew up as an only child with parents who were not the most loving or the most interested in him. He made a friend, Lilly Evans, who was a muggle but had a magical spark that he found out about and tried to explain to her. They were friends but excluded Lily's older sister and left her very very very resentful of the magical word and its people. At school, Lily was her only friend aside from the Slytherins that he felt he had to be close with in order to protect himself. But their friendship was strained. After a few years and a very  public humiliation, they stopped being friends and Snape was left feeling more hatred towards the Marauders than ever before. In a state of complete hatred and almost (in my opinion) desperation for something to belong to, Snape joined the Death Eaters and immediately regretted his decision when he learned that he would be the reason that Lily, the love of his life, would be hurt. When Voldemort ignored his plees of leaving the girl alone, Snape knew he had to do something to fix things. This is introspection  He saw the darkness that was inside himself and realized why he needed to change his ways. He had to find a way to 'save' Lily Evans ne Potter now that he had failed her. He went to Dumbledore for guidance and found an open and forgiving mind.

Ove the years he gained Dumbledore's trust and he began to trust Dumbledore as well. But there were things that went wrong. Dumbledore asked Snape to keep an eye out for Harry but Snape resented Harry for his father rather than caring about him for his mother. In Harry's fifth year when Harry needed Dumbledore and was given Snape as the only option, things did not go well. Dumbledore also did not trust Snape with all the information that he needed. Snape realized that all the time that he had spent trying his hardest through the hatred to watch out for Harry, the hours of torture he endured and was forced to put on others because of Voldemort, the masks he had to wear, the people he had to ally himself with and those he had to hurt were for nothing, because Harry had to die.

Snape died alone. Though Harry physically was in the room with him as he died, Snape had no one. At that point in time, Harry had not watched the pensieve and did not understand all the things that Snape had done for him. He couldn't tell Snape that he forgave him or that he was brave or thank him. Snape died without knowing that Harry knew the truth and that is the most alone I think a person can be. He gave up everything and did not know that it amounted to anything.

Major Arcana: 0 The Fool

Major Arcana: 0 The Fool
What it means facing you: beginnings, innocence, spontaneity, free spirit
What it means facing away from you: naivety, foolishness, recklessness, risk-taking

So this card is the first card in the first deck. It's also a card that is numbered zero and it's been unclear to me exactly what that means. But I did it and it's Colin Creevey and he's awesome.

Colin is like the leader of innocence. He comes from a muggle household into the wizarding world with wide eyes and an open mind. He reminds me a bit of Hermione because he seemed to know all about Harry. He marks Harry down as a hero though and follows him around like a lost puppy which also contributes to the innocence factor of this card. Colin is spontaneous in the wizarding world because he carried a camera around with him every where. While it might be a little weird for him to be fangirling over Harry Potter, it's nothing new for the wizarding world because they all kind of do that. He's spontaneous because he brings something to the magical world thats different. His obsession with taking pictures of everything is foreign to the students because many of them have grown up with moving pictures and ghosts floating around, but he hasn't. Everything in the wizarding world is new to him and beautiful. He takes pictures to capture what fascinated him. I think that if I was a Hogwarts student, I would be a lot like him.

He is a free spirit for all of those things that I just said. His fascination in things and his open-ness to magic are an example of that. While Colin was small and skinny and had a tendency to trip over himself in excitement, he also was strong and brave. He fought in the Battle of Hogwarts eve though it cost him his life. He wanted to protect the things that he cared about and it didn't matter to him that he was too young to be fighting. This also leads into recklessness and risk-taking. Colin did not have to go to battle, he was actually told not to because he was too young. But he went anyway. He took a huge risk that ended with him dead. Even if it was for a noble cause, it was still reckless. Colin's naivety and foolishness is apparent in his first year at Hogwarts (Harry's second). When he saw the Basilisk, instead of turning and running as far away as possible, he took out his camera. Because he looked at it though a camera lens, he did not die, but he still was petrified.

Colin was a good, enthusiastic, lovable kid, but he took life-threatening risks that cost him.

Major Arcana: III Empress

                                               

Major Arcana: III Empress

Meaning when the card is facing you: fertility, femininity, beauty, nature, abundance
Meaning when the card is facing away from you: creative block, dependence on others

Molly Weasley is a very interesting person. She can represent fertility because she is a mother of seven beautiful children: Bill, Charlie, Percy, Fred and George, Ron, and Ginny. She also "adopts" Harry into the family. She is main mother figure we see in the series, for Harry and for others.

She doens't have a lot of money, but she has an abundance of love. The Weasley family is pretty poor mostly because Molly is a stay at home mom, Arthur works at a low paying job at the Ministry and they have seven kids. They don't have a lot, but what they have, they share. Also, Molly makes huge amounts of wonderful food for everyone to make sure they are healthy, happy, and satisfied. Molly can represent beauty in the way she treats people, the way she loves them and cares for them.

Mrs. Weasley can be a creativity block, however. No matter how much she loves her children, she still doesn't always understand them and therefore kind of blocks them from being creative. She constantly bugs Bill about his long hair and talks about cutting it when he obviously is uncomfortable with that. She throws out creations that Fred and George made for their joke shop. They spent hours creating them and perfecting them, but she just throws them out likes it's nothing. She also is a bit smothering when she should know better. When Harry, Ron, and Hermione are preparing to go hunting for horcruxes, she tried to stop them from planning and also trying to figure out what they were planning to do even when they tell her it's a task they aren't allowed to talk about and they can't not complete it. These things that Molly does is not to be malicious or mean, they're out of misplaced love in her heart but there are a lot of creativity blocks that should not be over looked.

I think Molly fits this card really well. :)

Also I'm sorry for the delay, my queue isn't really working very well

Major Arcana: VIII Justice

Major Arcana: VIII Justice

Meaning when the card is facing you: justice, fairness, truth, cause and effect, law
Meaning when the card is facing away from you: unfairness, lack of accountability, dishonesty

Neville is basically the embodiment of all these things: from karma and justice to unfairness. From a young age, his family didn't believe in his magical abilities. They hung him outside a window and did other things to try and scare the magic out of him, without anything really working. He is given his father's wand which was not suited for him and therefore his magical abilities in school were not up to par so he was often viewed as a liability and not good at magic. He is made fun of and laughed at by Malfoy and his Slytherins, most teachers besides Professor Sprout and Mad-Eye Moody (who turns out not to be Mad-Eye Moody) don't see his potential, and his Grandma is never proud of him. But he turns that all around in little ways over the years. He shows his bravery in first year but Dumbledore is really the only one who acknowledges it. In fifth year, he proved his worth to not only his peers, but also his Grandma by fighting alongside Harry at the Ministry. In the seventh year Neville doesn't even need to try anymore to prove himself to everyone, it's already clear that he's brave and strong.

Neville Longbottom's parents were tortured to the point of insanity by Bellatrix Lestrange and they are in a ward in St. Mugo's Hospital for the rest of their lives. Neville is incredibly wonderful when he goes to visit them.An example we see of this is him accepting a candy wrapper from his mother as if it was the most wonderful thing in the world (which it kind of is because it's not like his mother can really give him anything else). He is kind and understanding towards them; he doesn't let his grandmother's negativity get him or his parents down, choosing to focus on the good rather than the bad.

Neville could have also been the "Chose One". He and Harry share the same things that the Prophecy about Voldemort and ?: parents defied Voldemort three time and that they were both born at the end of July. This is significant because obviously, Voldemort chose Harry over Neville (probably because the biggest difference between Harry and Neville was that Harry was a halfblood like Voldemort while Neville was a pureblood). Though he wasn't the "Chosen One", Neville still plays a very big role. IN the seventh book, when Neville kills Nagini, he destroys the last horcrux that Voldemort has besides the man himself. Without Neville doing this, Harry would not have been able to kill Voldemort.

THIS WAS A SHORT ANALYSIS. I USUALLY ELABORATE MORE. HERE IS AN EXPLANATION:
I love Neville Longbottom too much and I don't know what else to write about him without just repeating how amazing he is over and over and annoying everyone. Also, it's summer and I'm tired and studying for finals. I might add more later, but for now this is all I have for this week.

edited June 20, 2013 2:23am

Major Arcana: X Fortune, Wheel of

 
Major Arcana: X Fortune, Wheel of

Meaning of the card facing you: good luck, karma, life cycles, destiny, turning point
Meaning of the card facing away from you: bad luck, negative external forces, out of control

So when I did this, I had to cut out the drawing that I made so that I could make sure that I got it exactly the way I wanted it (as I have done for about 1/2 of my cards so far). The cut out made a beautiful negative space shape thing in the white paper. I don't have a picture of it right now, but I'll post it as soon as I get it because wow it's really awesome.

The Sorting Hat is a had the sorts the incoming first years into their Hogwarts Houses, Ravenclaw, Hufflypuff, Gryffindor, and Slytherin. It kind of reads the minds of the children that it sorts and places them based on who they are (and possibly bloodline). It has been around since Hogwarts was founded and has never failed to sort students.

I'm not sure how much the Sorting Hat represents good luck or bad luck, though it does sing about the bad things that it thinks is going to happen and gives good advice, though interHouse unity is not really something that Hogwarts students practice (which honestly makes me very sad. If someone what just been there for all those poor Slytherins, the wizarding world would probably not be in such a mess). It can be karma because it can look inside your head and places you based on what you've done/ have inside you so there might be some karma going around over there.

In Harry's case, the Sorting Hat has a lot to do with his destiny. Harry finds a home in Gryffindor House and becomes who he is because of it. Also, the Hat shows Harry that he had two possibilities: Gryffindor or Slytherin and he sealed whatever destiny he had when he chose Gryffindor. My personal opinion is that he would have thrived in Slytherin and managed not to become a dark lord, he might have picked up some really good qualities along the way as well. In general, for most people, the Sorting isn't that big a deal aside from the fact that you get placed with a bunch of people for the next seven years of your life. But for Harry, it was a very significant part of his life and impacted his outlook on life and the way he dealt with things.

During times of "negative external forces" and things are "out of control", the Sorting Hat can be very useful to a Gryffindor student, Harry and Neville being the examples for this. For Harry, the Sorting Hat came to help him defeat the Basilisk in the second book. Harry got the Hat from Fawkes and managed to pull the Sword of Gryffindor out of it which he used to slay the Basilisk. The snake, the memory of Tom Riddle, the diary, the Chamber of Secrets, and every thing in that place made it negative and out of control and without the Hat, it would have gotten worse. Actually Neville's story is very similar though the snake he was killing was Nagini in order to defeat Voldemort- this time in a more solid form.

Like most things in these books, the important things kind of creep up on you. They've kind of always been there, we just didn't know it until it was made clear for us. The Sorting Hat is a lot like that. It became a constant familiar thing that was kind of cool but not really because Harry needed it once and all that, but then Neville used it and we saw how much it was worth, how important it was.

Major Arcana: XIV Temperance

Major Arcana: XIV Temperance

My sketch on a science lab table

Meaning of the card facing you: balance, moderation, patience, purpose, meaning
Meaning of the card facing away from you: imbalance, excess, lack of long term vision

So I've been trying to figure out how to write why I think Dumbledore fits this Tarot card, and he does and I will explain it soon, but I just want to mention that I do not like Dumbledore. I wanted him to go with other cards, but honestly, other people fit them better and this was probably the best for him if I was going to have him in the deck at all. I haven't always not liked Dumbledore, in fact, he was one of my favorites, but after the fifth book I just couldn't. I started to see the way he treated Harry like a child and didn't let him know things that were important. The seventh book kind of solidified my dislike for him because we find out about how he treated Snape and led him and Harry on, how he never told whole truths and kept details that were essential to himself. I don't really want to go into detail about it because this card is not about lies and manipulation, but I just needed to say it. Now on with the show!

Dumbledore represents balance and moderation because he is level headed, makes good decisions, and understands what needs to be done, even if it's unpleasant. In the fifth book, he allows himself to be kicked out of Hogwarts because he knows Harry needs to stay there and not get in trouble with the ministry. He takes some pressure off of Harry's back, balancing out the anger that the minister has for him and takes it onto himself. Of course, Umbridge is still unbalanced and unfair towards Harry but Dumbledore takes the whole Dumbledore Army's thing away from Harry so that he doesn't get punished. Dumbledore also tries very hard to balance out the hate between Snape and Harry. When Harry comes and blames things on Snape, Dumbledore always gives him reasons why it is not. He tries to make him see that Snape is not as bad as Harry thinks he is. He is unsuccessful, but it is the thought that counts. Dumbledore has been a balance for Snape as well. He gave Snape a safe place to be- both at Hogwarts and with Voldemort. He helped Snape see all the things he could be doing for the order and still remain a spy- gaining Voldemort's respect along with the Order's.

Dumbledore can represent patience as well. Harry shouts at him for a long long time after the ordeal at the ministry in the fifth book and he just sits there and lets him. He already feels horrible and sad and guilty for everything that has happened, but he allows Harry to get everything he is feeling out in the open. In the fourth book he is the calm, patient one when Harry's name is pulled out of the goblet (though in the movie, he is IN A RAGE but in this case the movies don't count). He is patient and is able to calm the other school leaders down. In general Dumbledore is a pretty patient guy. He is very old (J.K.R. said he was 150 in an interview, though the dates she gives us in the books point to him being about 120 when he died) and has seen a lot-from Grindlewald and the Deathly Hallows to Harry pulling a sword out of the Sorting Hat. Not to mention a few crazy kids running around the school (the Marauders, the Weasley twins), incompetent ministers of magic, and Tom Riddle/Voldemort infecting the world with his hate.

Dumbledore gives meaning and purpose to a great many things. I think he helps give purpose and meaning to magic for Harry, Hagrid, Dobby and many other students and people who have found themselves in tough situations. He is trusting and kind and people respect him. He also give purpose and meaning to the books themselves. Even if I don't particularly like him, Dumbledore still holds a lot of meaning to me and I'm sure thousands of other people.

He could represent excess because his experience with the Deathly Hallows showed how he allowed the idea of the Greater Good to get to his head because he was able bodied and very smart- it was in excess as he was bored  until he found the DHs. He also experienced and excess amount of traumatizing experiences like watching his sister die possibly at his own magic, Voldemort, Grindelwald, and things we don't know about but can imagine.

Instead of representing a lack of long term vision, he is the opposite. He had a plan, possibly from the moment James and Lily died or when he heard the prophecy. He planned ahead for the horcruxes- destroying them and preparing Harry to destroy them as well- and the DHs and his own death. It is unclear exactly how much he knew would happen or that he planned out, but he seemed to know what he was doing and often found ways to make things better went they went a way he didn't exactly want them to (like Sirius' death). He had a lot of resources- spys, memories, knowledge, etc. and he made good use of all of them, even if it meant sacrificing a few people along the way.

Major Arcana: I Magician

Major Arcana: I Magician

Sketch I made before
sharpie-ing it to the
card

I traced this onto the card

When the card is facing you: power, skill, concentration, action, resourcefulness

When the card is facing away from you: manipulation, poor planning, latent talent

I chose Harry as the Magician because he has all of these traits, both the good and the bad. Harry is a powerful and skilled wizard. He defeated Voldemort when he was a baby and continued to do so until he finally killed him. In the end, he becomes the master of the Elder Wand, a very powerful wand that people kill for (literally). While defeating Voldemort sounds like regular hero over throwing the bad guy kind of stuff, there is more to it. Harry lived through Voldemort penetrating his mind and planting horrible things there, killing many people that he cares about, being crucio-ed, being cut, possessed, screamed at, cursed, and manipulated. He actually has to kill Voldemort seven times, and has to die himself in order to get rid of him. Harry was able to produce a Patronus at age 13 and take on 100 Dementors. He lived through the Chamber of Secrets (and got help from the Sorting Hat- which only happens to the most brave, most worthy of people), the attack at the ministry, and a few full on battles. I honestly don't think I can list everything that Harry has done because there is so much. To summarize, Harry is a very strong and powerful wizard.

He is also resourceful. When he and his class mates needed a place to study Defense in his fifth year, he used resources (Dobby) to help find a safe place for them. he was able to teach his peers things that a teacher should have been able to without the help of any adults or anyone but his friends and the Room of Requirement itself (the place Dobby helped Harry find). In stressful situations, Harry has managed to use the things he has to get himself out and alive. He was resourceful when he used Feliz Felicis to get the memory he needed from Slughorn, and also when he got Griphook to help him infiltrate Gringotts.

I don't think I need to explain that he can also be action-full. Everything above kind of proves that he is. :)

Harry is like the definition of poor planning and manipulation. Everything that he does, with the exception of a few things in the seventh book are rash and without premeditation. He's headstrong and stubborn and is more of a act first, think later than a planner, but it comes with the being a Gryffindor thing. He is manipulative because even if he doesn't like it, he is, to quote A Very Potter Musical, Harry freaking Potter, and everyone (or almost everyone) wants to please him. He is famous. He easily gets out of trouble and usually gets his way. If he wants to, he can get students and adults to listen to him. He also has many people who have his back, love him, and believe in him to back him up and get things done.

Harry Potter is a wizard (the wizard) and therefore is the Magician. (Dumbledore and Snape were also considered for this role in the cards, but they have other characteristics and stories that make them who they are and I have different cards for them to represent)

Major Arcana: XIII Death

Major Arcana XIII Death

This is the first card of the Major Arcana that I drew. It is the 8th out of 22. When I was working to figure out which Harry Potter person or thing that I wanted to represent Death, I came up with four different things that I wanted to use. As I am just beginning this deck and I wanted to get used to drawing in such tiny areas with ultra thin sharpies and not much room for making mistakes (though I do have a few hundred blank cards, so if I do mess up badly, I can easy replace it), I went with the simplest of the four: The Deathly Hallows. (the others are: The Veil, Kings Cross, and Death [from the Deathly Hallows story])

When the card is facing towards you it means: endings, beginnings, change, transformation, transition
When the card is facing away from you it means: resistance to change, inability to move

The Deathly Hallows are made up of three parts: the wand, the resurrection stone, and the invisibility cloak. They can each represent both sides of Death.

The Elder Wand is a wand that was transferred from hand to hand by ending the life that controlled it. It brought many strength and power that lead more often than not to a very bloody end. It is endings because it ended people's lives; it is beginnings because it allowed its new masters the power to do things that they had never done before; it is transformation and transition because the new masters often became arrogant and boastful as well as powerful, they became different versions of themselves; it is the resistance to change or inability to move because for years and years this wand caused bloodshed, wars, hunts, fights, etc. and no one bothered to stop because the idea of a wand that made you the most powerful wizard in the world was too strong.

The Resurrection Stone is a stone that can bring the dead back to life. It created new life for those who had passed. It also brought endings however. When the second brother- the one who asked for this stone from Death- turned it three times in his hands and got his dead wife back, she was hallow and sad and cold and he committed suicide so that he could join her in death rather than see her suffer with the living. It is inability to move and resistance to change because when the second brother uses the stone, it is because he is unable to move on from the death of the woman he loved. Harry uses the stone when he thinks that he has no room to move because he needs to die to save the people he is fighting for. He calls his parents, Remus Lupin, and Sirius Black to accompany on his way to meet his death. They are all people whose death he can't move on from and that haunt him.

The Invisibility Cloak is a cloak that turned the wearer invisible. It was of better quality than any invisibility cloak in the world because it was made by Death himself. It belonged to Harry's dad before he was murdered by Voldemort but it could have had the potential to save him had it not been in Dumbledore's possession at the time. This is how it can represent endings. It can represent beginnings because Harry receives it from Dumbledore in his first year and it gives him the ability to travel around the school at night, when and where he shouldn't but ultimately giving him the power to find a way to defeat Voldemort. It is the beginning of much adventure and discovery for Harry and his friends. It is transformation or transition because well it changes you from being able to be seen to being unable to be seen. It has also been passed down through from generation to generation which is how it ends up being Harry's. It can resist change because even though it is very very very very very old and has been through a lot, it never stopped being useful. Once, in fourth year Harry was using the cloak to get back to the Gryffindor tower and he got stuck in one of the trip stairs. If it hadn't been for the Invisibility Cloak, he would have been in a lot of trouble.