Gemini (21 May - 20 June)

original art by Bex McKay

Joyce Carol Oates writes more in her lunch hour than most people do in a lifetime

Joyce Carol Oates (16 June 1938) may or may not be a typical Gemini, but this month’s tarot card, the 8 of swords, accurately encompasses both her life and her work.

The 8 of swords upright talks signifies someone under pressure, or drama. Oates’s own writing discipline is all about pressure. While in college at Syracuse University, she honed her writing skills by writing novels and then throwing them out. Her writing tackles big, difficult themes, some of which were inspired by people and events with which she was personally acquainted. The intensity of her themes makes that pressure even more impressive when you consider the fact that Oates has published an average of two books a year over the decades of her career.

Geminis are well-recognized as being great writers, artists, and journalists. Their quick wits and creativity lend themselves to any endeavor that requires invention. Geminis are intellectually curious and ruled by Mercury, and that trait is reflected in the breadth of subjects Oates has tackled in her literary career, and the fact that she writes novels, short stories, plays, poetry and nonfiction. The Gemini ability to see things from many perspectives is a large part of what has made Oates’s work successful.

When reversed, the 8 of swords indicates having faith in oneself, and Oates is self-assured enough to go against the accepted advice given by most famous writers. Most writing classes will tell you to sit in your chair for hours at a time, or until you have written some huge number of words. Oates takes a different approach: give yourself a tiny amount of time. Challenge yourself to write as much as you can in five minutes. When the clock is ticking away just three hundred seconds, you have an incentive to make the most of them.

Some critics have disparaged her huge number of works, somehow implying that she has invested her energy in quantity rather than quality, but Oates has paid little attention to those critics. One reviewer suggested that the criticism stems from reviewers’ inability to judge any of her new work without being familiar with all of her back catalog.

We should all be so lucky.