Robert Graves was a towering figure in 20th Century literature with his WW1 war memoirs (Goodbye to All That), poetry, historical novels (I, Claudius, The Golden Ass) and writing on mythology (The White Goddess). Yet he was irrevocably scarred by his experiences in World War One, where he was wounded at the Somme. He knew Siegfried Sassoon well and another writer Edmund Blunden, though both fell out with him over his recollections of the war in Goodbye to All That.
Grave was physically fragile and mentally troubled after the war and embarked on a messy affair and menage a trois with his secretary and his wife. Laura Riding his secretary was none too stable either and she at one point threw herself off the balcony of the four-storey flat. Graves had to foot the bill for her hospital stay which prompted him to write his best-selling war memoir which he regarded as a pot-boiler.
He was born 24 July 1895 4.26am Wimbledon, England, and had the signature generational Neptune Pluto in Gemini square his Venus which would not make for a settled or conventional emotional life. His ‘shell shock’ made him hyper-active sexually and his relentlessly prolific output suggests he was driven to write and create as well. The world got the benefit but he was not a contented man. He had a Leo Sun on his Ascendant square a 4th house rigidly conscientious Saturn in Scorpio and he had an impatient Moon Mars in Leo.
That generation were marked by the Neptune Pluto conjunction which together creates a fey, mystical mix of energies, wonderful and terrifying at the same time. Historically the combination is connected with the rise of great powers with epically brutal leaders; with art, especially erotic literature; with scientific advances in such intangibles as electricity, radio and telephone; with religious events; and with scandals.
His 12th Harmonic chart of the sacrificial victim is marked with a Grand Trine, T Square and the brutal Mars opposition Pluto.
Edmund Blunden, 1 November 1896, was a writer and poet, who survived two years on the front through Ypres, Somme and Passchendaele without injury though he was gassed and suffered mentally for the rest of his life.
He had his Sun in Scorpio with Uranus Saturn conjunct in Scorpio as well and probably his Virgo Moon square Neptune Pluto which opposed his Venus. His victim 12th harmonic is also strongly aspected with a Neptunian Grand Trine and a stark Saturn opposition Jupiter square Pluto.
Sassoon’s 12th harmonic is similarly prominent with a Grand Trine, formed into a Kite by a war-like Saturn opposition Pluto and destructive Pluto square Mars.
What is clear from Graves’ chart was the effect of tr Neptune moving into Leo which was moving to conjunct his Sun and and Ascendant and square his Saturn as the war got underway. And both Blunden and Sassoon were debilitated by tr Neptune in the immediate aftermath of the war when their psychological damage hit home. Neptune in Leo is traditionally associated with the Roaring Twenties and the giddy inflation and flamboyance which followed the carnage of WW1 but less so with its insidious effects on those with front line experience.
I have only just noticed that I put Claudia’s instead of Claudius. I apologise, especially to those who found it most irritating. I can blame my cack-handedness, but the predictive text has a lot to answer for!
Hi Liz Im not sure its true going by the history of the Piscean era and whats happening currently, but we have certainly convinced ourselves of it collectively, and are currently wallowing in it, as evidenced by the obsession with torture porn and horror of the most grosteque kind.
Some might say that looking into the face of evil too much and dwelling on it, amplifies it.
Focusing on it and endlessly analysing it, certainly hasnt stopped it. I suspect we have as usual, let the pendulumn swing too far.
Interesting that Robert Graves was still writing “First World War” Poetry long after the conflict. One of his finest poems Last Day of Leave was produced in 1948.
It is one of the mysteries of life that terrible wars often lead to great poetry. It is arguable that the poets of the Second World War such as Sidney Keyes, John Jarmain, Keith Douglas, Alun Lewis, Richard Spender etc were every bit as good as their First World War predecessors.
Fixed star Zosma is the “victim star”. Let us look at parans to Zosma in the charts of
Graves, Blunden. For Graves, Zosma rises as his Moon rises. Zosma culminates as
Venus, emotional life, culminates….giving depression, difficulties with self-worth.
For Sassoon, fixed star Facies is on the IC as the Moon is also on the IC,
giving “emotionally experiencing turmoil in life.”
Source: Bernadette Brady’s “Starlite” a fixed star parans description program.
I Claudia’s and Claudia’s the God are both wonderful reads!
“Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out” – I, Claudius 1976
My favourite quote from the TV series – in fact of all time where TV series are concerned.
Maybe that is what life is about. Maybe we have to sink to the depths to see the horror mankind is capable of before we can transcend it. WWI, WWII and the Holocaust, nuclear bombing of Japan, Ukraine…… the lessons of history are there but do we ever learn.
Nice one, Liz.
That series is a treasure-house of brilliant quotes.
I have often thought the same, Liz.
Me with my Uranus/Mercury just in the 8th and my Pluto firmly in the 8th. Certainly has been true on a personal level. I know where I could have gone.. the darkness is there and very seductive. But oh so difficult to come back once experienced.
It has been important to both understand the multigenerational “world” trauma in me, in my family.. and then ripple out to try to understand “evil” in all people. I would say it has been the primary raison d’etre for me.
An interesting book is “People of the Lie”, written by Scott Peck (of The Road Less Travelled).
It’s written awhile ago, and the author is clear he does not have clear answers… however… he does explore “evil” in a very interesting way.
I have read the People of the Lie and the White Goddess. One of my favourite books is the WWI Poems. I have sun/moon midpoint in Scorpio and as well as Sun conjunct Pluto. I have seen the darkness. I live by the water and sit and watch the boats. Ironically many people will just come and sit next to me and open up. I don’t mind, as I understand. Pluto is a healer – death and rebirth. Both Graves and Sassoon gave others healing by their experience of the Great War , as their poetry and writing is a kind of heartfelt beauty. It may seem odd to write pain is a release, yet it is, as if you feel something, you can build on it.
Hi Liz Im not sure its true going by the history of the Piscean era and whats happening currently, but we have certainly convinced ourselves of it collectively, and are currently wallowing in it, as evidenced by the obsession with torture porn and horror of the most grosteque kind.
Some might say that looking into the face of evil too much and dwelling on it, amplifies it.
Focusing on it and endlessly analysing it, certainly hasnt stopped it. I suspect we have as usual, let the pendulumn swing too far.