Birthday Twins : May 8 : Romain Gary
Cats: art and literature, astrology 101, birthday twins|
Romain Gary
Sun: Taurus
Ascendant: Unknown
Moon: Libra
More of today’s birthday twins at dlisted
Who do you get when you cross Jackie Collins with William Shakespeare? Romain Gary! I know most of you will probably never have heard of him, but I have a lot of affection for Mr. Gary, which started when a friend of mine took out one of his books from the library solely based on the name, Lady L. The book is gloriously trashy, written in an exaggerated campy way, and led to reading some of his other books, such us Promise at Dawn, his autobiography.
It came as a bit of shock, therefore, to find out that he is one of France’s most esteemed writers. In fact, he is the only writer to have one France’s top literary prize of serious fiction, the Prix Goncourt, twice. When I asked my French friend’s about him, they rattled on about his amazing ability and the subtlety of his prose. I assumed that something was lost in translation, until today, when researching this entry, I found out he was the brainforce behind one of my favorite Cult Movie Classics, the super-kitschy White Dog.
Gary is maybe best known outside of France for his tempestuous true-love relationship with the American actress Jean Seberg. When they were married, Seberg got involved in the civil right movement, especially promoting the cause of the Black Panthers. The FBI decided she was an enemy of the state, and started covertly harassing her (all documented!) and started the rumour that the child she was carrying wasn’t Gary’s but a Black Panther love child. The stress caused her to miscarry, and Gary had the baby buried in a glass coffin to prove it was white and his (which in the end it turned out it wasn’t anyway). Crazy!
They got a divorce, and Seberg committed suicide some years later, a year after which Gary did the same.
So lets look at some indications of writing talent in Gary’s chart. When you want to find writing talent, you look to a few things: the third house, which rules communication and writing, as well as its ruler, Mercury. We do not know Gary’s birth time, but we can examine his natural third house which contains a stellium of planets, including artistic Venus, responsible Saturn and powerful Pluto. Together this shows not just talent, but the ability to make a stable life from it. Moreover, this stellium is found in Gemini which is the natural ruler of the 3rd house and ruled by communicative, intellectual Mercury. His Mercury is also well placed, conjunct his Sun in Taurus. Taurus is ruled by Venus, which rules the arts in general.
