Category: National identity

2025: The Year of Flux
It was a shocking development. They knew that she was the Sultan’s favourite, the mother of his children, but who would have thought that he would actually marry the Ruthenian woman?  In the year 1533, Suleiman the Magnificent wed his concubine Roxelana, making her Sultana, the most powerful [...]
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On the “Other”: Lilith, Harvey Weinstein and the Fate of Nations
Why are there so many Liliths to choose from astrologically? I asked myself this question recently, and wondered if the answer might not lie in the archetype herself. Just to be clear. There are: True Lilith, Mean Lilith… and the asteroid Lilith… and furthermore, in some software, [...]
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Astrology of Now: Flying Flamingoes, Black Rod, and the Bendings
Even by the standards of that operatic place, the scenes in parliament were extraordinarily theatrical last night. Starring roles this time were taken by– Mr John Bercow as The Speaker Ms Sarah Clarke as Black Rod House of Commons as The Chorus Opposition Benches as The Choir It’s [...]
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America’s Pluto Transit: The Ravaging
A few weeks ago, The New York Times carried an editorial by Charles Blow, which begins like this: “America, as we knew it, is lost. “Not completely gone and not irrevocably ended, but forever altered. Or, maybe it is fair to say that our concept of America itself was a concoction, [...]
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One Night In Cologne
In the early hours of 2016, more than a 100 women were sexually assaulted by roaming gangs of men in the streets of the German city of Cologne. At least one was raped. At least 1000 men are said to have been involved in the organised attacks. It took five days for the media to catch […]
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On Pisces
Sadko In The Underwater Kingdom by Ilya Repin (Wikimedia Commons) From Tunisia to Elizabeth Taylor, you never know who you’re going to swim past down there in the blue, blue sea. With the Sun still in Pisces, visit or revisit these OA posts on or about the sign of the Fishes. A Fortnight [...]
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Turkey: A Question Of Identity
Agia Sofia: layers of meaning Photo: Osvaldo Gago, wikimedia commons If you stand still in the middle of the vast space of the Agia Sofia, Istanbul’s great mosque/church, as the masses of tourists swirl around you and the silvery light filters from high up windows, you can almost feel [...]
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Arguing for a Scorpio Rising US National Chart
The eagle is another symbol for Scorpio. My friend Michael Wolfstar, who runs the website Neptune Cafe, wrote to me after reading my previous post American Aprils. He didn’t disagree with the substance of it, but he wanted to point out that the chart he uses for the US has Scorpio Rising [...]
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The Nation’s Soul
Ted Hughes was best known as a powerful nature poet before he was made laureate in 1984. It seemed like a strange choice; this poet of fox and moor, black-backed gull and deadly pike, above all of wildness, asked to write about the baroque, many-layered, structured, civilised, profoundly tamed [...]
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Liberté, Egalité, Identité
The 1998 World Cup winning French football team was an emblem of French diversity. The National Front said it wasn’t “French” enough. France is having a weird and unnerving time of it. Everything that seemed certain about the country is being shaken, questioned and has yet to [...]
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