Advanced · 14 min
Gesture, gaze, clothing and animals
Read the body language of the Waite–Smith figures: what the hands do, where the eyes look, what the clothes say and how the animals move, with color only as Smith's 1909 coloring.
In this lesson you will
- Read a figure's hands, gaze and posture before you reach for a keyword.
- Use clothing and animals as clues to role, readiness and how a force is handled.
- Treat color as Pamela Colman Smith's 1909 coloring, not as something the VeilSoul deck shows.
Two friends tell you the same news, that they are leaving their jobs. One says it with arms crossed, looking at the floor; the other smiles and opens her hands. You read bodies every day, and you read them before you hear the words.
Read the body before the object
The figures in the Waite–Smith deck are posed as carefully as actors on a stage. Smith had worked in the theater, and it shows: hands that point, lift or clasp, eyes that look away or look in, bodies that turn their backs. Those poses carry much of the meaning before you even look at the suit symbol a figure holds.
This lesson gives you four questions to ask of any figure. What are the hands doing? Where are the eyes looking, and what are they not looking at? What is the figure wearing, and what is the animal beside it doing?
This lesson is part of Plus
Plus opens every lesson of the Practitioner, Reader and Advanced tiers, with practice that explains every answer.
What the lesson covers
- Hands
- Gaze
- Clothing and animals
- Practice
Foundations and the first lesson of every course are free.