(Tarot Prompts for Writers)
Keep the image and meaning of The Star 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. Write a hopeful tale.
First line prompts
- One of the stars was much brighter than the others.
- They lay on the dock, half drunk, and watched the stars.
- She was about to give up when she heard, in the distance, the sound of water.
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.
Character Prompt
Your protagonist is a star.
Maybe they’re a literal star personified, like in Stardust, a celestial body of some sort. Or maybe they’re a mythical character made into a constellation, like Perseus and Andromeda. Or maybe they’re a movie star or a rock star. Major, minor, shooting, falling, exploding — any kind of star that excites you will do.
Think about the Star, but go beyond the card to create a character that moves you.
Maybe your Star is waiting to be born. Or maybe she’s at the end of her life. Maybe she’s a star in a different galaxy, or maybe she’s in some earthly middle school dreaming of the future.
Consider the character’s exterior (looks/age/abilities) and interior (temperament/interests/beliefs). Think about their history and their day-to-day life. How do they feel about being a star? Was it worth the sacrifices to get here? What do they look down on from their starry position? Do they have any starlit friends? Enemies? Do they have hopes or dreams? What’is left when you become a star?
Think of a problem your star might have, and show their character to your reader through how they deal with it.
Planners can write a character sketch and a diary entry about what’s on the star’s mind.
Pantsers can write a scene of the star blazing brightly.
Begin with the character and see where it takes you.
POV Prompt
In tarot, The Star sees things clearly from a distance. In fiction, too, distance smoothes over a story. Whether that makes for clarity is up to you.
Looking at the earth from the moon, our beautiful blue marble looks so peaceful — that’s what distance does. It’s a point of view that distorts, like any other. You can be too close to a story to see it clearly, but you can be so far from it that you lose touch with the actual experience.
Write a story from a great distance, maybe even a star’s distance, light years away. Or maybe not quite so far.
Maybe it’s an older person looking back on youth, or a parent looking back on the youth of their grown child. Maybe it’s a traveler missing their home, a prisoner missing their freedom, a lone survivor missing their lost community. Or maybe it’s someone glad to have gotten away — a successful someone returning to their dreary home town for a funeral, an adjusted someone encountering an abuser after decades of therapy. Maybe it’s a future human reflecting on their ancestors (us), or an afterlife attorney minimizing a life of crime.
Whatever story you write, skew it with a distant point of view.
When we look back on life from a distance, what was once so important becomes insignificant, what we once ruminated over we completely forget. And what we do remember takes on oversized importance, as if it were all there was. We can grow nostalgic for times that were actually awful, we can accept losses that actually tore us apart. There is some clarity in distance, sure, but mostly there’s just a great big gap.
Write through this gap. Tell us your story from a great distance.
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; Druid Craft deck illustrated by Will Worthington; Radiant Rider-Waite deck illustrated by Pamela Colman Smith; Gilded Tarot by Ciro Marchetti (also shown in the box below).
Catherine Austen 