Sunday, November 26, 2006

When Pluto met Gemini

During my early teenage years, in a small English market town , I would regularly haunt the local library. It was there that I discovered a few books by some American writers whose style I admired greatly - enough to start dreaming of emulating them, and becoming a writer or journalist myself. "Dream on" was the message of my headmistress (paraphrased) at a brief career interview. So I did - and do!

The writers who impressed me had something in common, something which I discovered today, as I set about writing this blog entry. They were all born with Pluto in Gemini. Two had Sagittarian Suns, two Aquarians, and one with Sun in Leo, one Virgo.

Sinclair Lewis 7 Feb. 1885 Sauk Center, Minnesota

Dorothy Parker 22 Aug. 1893 West End, New Jersey ( astrolreports says @ 9.50pm)

James Thurber 8 Dec. 1894 Columbus, Ohio

Ogden Nash 19 Aug. 1902 Rye, New York

S.J. Perelman 1 Feb. 1904 Brooklyn New York

H. Allen Smith 19 Dec 1907 McLeansboro, Illinois.

They were humourists or satirists, all different yet similar. I've looked at their natal charts, but mainly without the advantage of birth times. I notice that in all charts except Dorothy Parker's there is one fairly tight opposition. Lewis has Moon in Scorpio opposing Neptune in Taurus. Thurber's Sun/Venus in Sagittarius opposes Pluto/Neptune in Gemini. Ogden Nash has Virgo Mercury opposing Pisces Moon. Perelman has Sun/Saturn in Aquarius opposing Moon in Leo. H.A. Smith's Sagittarius Sun opposes Moon/Pluto in Gemini. I'm not sure if, or how, this is significant, but I found it interesting.

Gemini has connections with communication and transportation. During Pluto's transit of this sign, 1883 - 1912, there were fantastic achievements in these areas. The first subway was built in London, the first automatic telephone switchboard was introduced, Marconi invented radio telegraphy, and Zeppelin built his airship.

Gemini is abstract curiosity seeking to form a picture of the world, and to communicate those perceptions to others. So Gemini also represents writing, and presumably writers. Pluto must have brought a long-lasting period of intense energy to those engaged in this area. I'm tempted to babble about Gemini being light-hearted, carefree etc, but let's not forget who else was born into the same generation - Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Ayatollah Khomeini. These men too were communicators, but of a far darker persuasion. Not all writers born with Pluto in Gemini leaned towards humour either : T.S. Eliot, J.R.R.Tolkein, Ernest Hemingway, George Orwell, John Steinbeck all were of this same generation. Excellence in writing was a definite feature throughout Pluto's visit to Gemini. I guess we could say that they were all born "under a writer's sky".

Now that I've whetted my own appetite, I'll continue to write a few paragraphs about each of my "super six".

TO BE CONTINUED.







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