(Tarot Prompts for Writers)
Keep the image and meaning of The High Priestess in mind as you develop a story. But go beyond the card — don’t stress about any aspects you “should” include. The card is just a tool to prompt ideas. You can take it anywhere. Dig deep into the priestess’s book of knowledge.
First line prompts
- I turned another page, my eager fingers black with ink.
- She’d been waiting for him, he could tell, waiting ages in that straight-spined world.
- Night had fallen but she wasn’t afraid.
Continue the scene for another 500 words, in any direction you wish to take it. Change to third or first person or switch genders as you see fit. Make this an opening to a longer work or a complete flash fiction.
Setting Prompt
Tarot-lovers with another preferred deck can use that to inspire their setting prompt — maybe a bright throne room or dark wood — but I’ll use this dim bare landscape…
Your story opens as evening falls, outside, in lush grass. A chair has been set on the grass and a person sits in the chair. It might be you or someone else. There could be a whole crowd of people in this spot, but the person in the chair is special.
Remember the meaning of the High Priestess, but go beyond the card itself to imagine this world at the start of a story.
Consider the time and place. Is it here and now? Shakespeare in the park? Storytime around a campfire? Or is it deep in the past in a world veined in mystery? Or far in the future when all we know has collapsed and vanished — all but a few books and thrones.
Think about what you might see and hear and smell in this place. Who is here with you? What’s their mood? Why have they gathered here tonight? Something is surely about to happen.
Describe this world and the people in it. Planners can do a setting sketch — time and place, five senses, maybe a map, and notes on what might happen here.
Pantsers can write a paragraph or three, as a character approaches the chair.
Character Prompt
Your protagonist has esoteric knowledge. People are always asking them for advice. Supplicant after supplicant, all of them needing help, so many of them with the same basic problems unable to see the obvious answers.
Think about the High Priestess and the ways that others see her, and create a character who has much knowledge she closely guards — and imagine a story where others try to gain that knowledge through various and possibly nefarious means.
Consider the character’s exterior (species/gender/age/abilities) and interior (temperament/interests/beliefs/fears). Think about her history — how long has she studied and how did she come into this position? What propels her to listen to those who seek her help? Does she play favourites? What does she do in her spare time? Does she control her own life? Other lives? What does her future have in store? Is she happy? Will she stay and stay?
Now show that character to your reader.
Planners can write a character sketch and a diary entry about how she got here and what she thinks of those around her.
Pantsers can write a scene of the character interacting with supplicants one night when there’s a lunar eclipse or a meteor shower.
Object Prompt
A book.
This book can look like the High Priestess’s — it might be blank or written in strange script, old and dusty with heavy pages — but it doesn’t have to! Imagine any book that could contain a secret. A teen’s journal. A killer’s confession. A witch’s book of shadows. Death’s book of names. A world-renowned chef’s book of secret recipes.
What does the book look like? Feel like? What’s it made of? How old is it? What’s inside it? Is it hand-written or printed? In what language? Is it stained or pristine? What’s its history? How many hands have touched it? What world was it made in?
Who has this book? Who else wants it? Why? What could be inside it to make it worth guarding, or stealing?
Write a scene where a character finds or hides or exposes this book.
Thematic Prompts
- Guarding secrets.
- Someone gives advice that goes unheeded.
- Sometimes our intuition is dead wrong.
Freewrite for five minutes on any of these themes. Wax poetic. Bring your knowledge into the light.
Happy writing!
Images on this page are by the following artists:
Banner, left to right: Marseilles deck engraved by Nicolas Conver; Dragon Tarot illustrated by Roger and Linda Garland; Tarot Balbi by Domenico Balbi; Gilded Tarot by Ciro Marchetti; Radiant Rider-Waite deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith; Druid Craft deck illustrated by Will Worthington (also featured alone in mid-page).
Catherine Austen 