Customer Reviews

Chart Interpretation Handbook: Guidelines for Understanding the Essentials of the Birth Chart

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Stephen Arroyo is in my opinion the best astrologer of our time. He is able to combine impeccable technique with a deep understanding of the human being and its psyche. His astrology is a reflection of his humanistic orientation and his keen insight. All his books are an incredible worthwhile read for both the beginning and the veteran astrologer.

In his Chart Interpretation Handbook, Arroyo gives us a way of looking at the birth chart in terms of the energetic building blocks within it. Unlike more cookbook style texts, he does not provide just a list of planets, signs, houses but teaches the reader how to tune into the chart in a more subtle way. At first this text might seem a bit vague, but it is ultimately a text in which Arroyo shows us his particular way of sensing the subtle nuances of the astrological energies.

Arroyo also in this text is a master at showing us how to unravel the themes within the birth chart. I particularly loved his description of the sub-tones of planets that is something that I use to this day in my chart interpretations. Stephen Arroyo is a fantastic astrologer and writer. All his books are marvellous and this one is no exception. I cannot recommend it enough.

Those familiar with Stephen Arroyo will not be surprised by the exceptional quality of this handbook which builds on his previous best-selling astrology books. In fact some of the content is directly lifted from previous work such as "Astrology,Karma and Transformation", but the book is no less value for money as a result. Step by step, Arroyo uses clear, modern language to reveal the essential meanings of any birth chart. Wisdom and clear intelligent insights spring from every page and even an experienced astrologer can benefit from Arroyo's imaginative and precise use of language.

Unlike some of Arroyo's early work, the Chart Interpretation Handbook is expertly laid out, due no doubt to the editing skills of Jerilynn Marshall who Arroyo enthusiastically acknowledges. Its all here: the four elements and the twelve signs, key concepts for the planets, the planets in the signs, the ascendant and midheaven, the houses and planetary aspects. And, true to Arroyo's sense of humour (always bubbling away beneath the profound depth of his writing), there's even a couple of cartoons!

I had been a practising astrologer for several years when this came out, and after one read through, the Chart Interpretation Handbook became my primary reference for birth chart work. It still is today! Highly recommended.

This has to be the best astrology book I own! Arroyo goes down to the basics of astrology, and teachs us how to use them like a tool, rather than learn traditional interpretations by heart. This book helps wannabe astrologers to think astrologically and to have a scientific approach to a chart. Astrology immediately feels more serious, less like "dabbling with the occult". I highly recommend it to scepical people, they might change their opinion about astrology!

This book is the most valuable reference tool I own. I've always admired the way Stephen Arroyo makes astrology accessible and useful without all the hocus-pocus. He brings out the building blocks of chart interpretation and encourages the reader to think instead of just leaning on tradition. Everything you need is here: elements, signs, planets, houses, the trips and quads, aspects...

The language is clear, modern, and anyone from the most neophytic can understand and apply it immediately.

As a new student to astrology I appreciate Stephen Arroyo's straightforward style. Easy to read and easy to understand, Arroyo breaks down chart interpretation into the basic elements of astrology.

If you are familiar with Parker's Astrology, this book is totally different. While Parker's is very detailed, a sort of encyclopedia for astrology, this is a much smaller volume that gives general guidelines. Arroyo deliberately kept things general. Evidently he thinks it's best to think in broad terms and to only deal with the essentials of a chart when interpreting it. By teaching us the basics of astrology Arroyo helps us do that. I see Arroyo's book and the Parker book being very complementary--being a new student I appreciate what each has to offer.

This is a great place to start of you are serious about understanding the fundamentals of astrology.

I find this book, like all his books, superb. I have studied astrology for over 30 years and still go back and back again to Stephen Arroyo's books. I think he is head and shoulders above all the other astrologers I have read in terms of enlightenment and intelligent understanding about the true nature and purpose of this cosmic science. I just wish he would write more books!

I understand I will be quite alone in this list of reviews. All the reviewers have rated this book with 5 stars...I have everyone of Arroyo's published books, and this one is definitely not even close to his usual standard. It is a completely usless and out of fashion cookbook product in the style of Margaret Hone's Textbook, although I would say that the late Hone work is far superior. I cannot see how a seasoned astrologer could profit from it, and for the beginner I am sure there are far better works, to name but one, Basil Fearrington's The New Way to Learn Astrology is by far a more useful and quite better book.As far as it comes it seems that Mr.Arroyo has already said everything he had to in his wonderful older works. If the author wouldn't had accustom us to such excelent books, I may be less harsh on this one. I just cannot.

Over the past five years, I've read probably thirty books on astrology, having become intersted in the subject about the time of my Saturn return. I was wholeheartedly enthusiastic in learning everything I could about astrology, although I was more interested in the psychological aspects than the technical ones (i.e., midpoint analyses, secondary progressions etc.) To be honest, I can't consider myself to be a true believer, because it seems peculiar to think that these "random" space bodies can ultimately yield to our anthropomorphic projections of their meaning based on Greco-Roman mythology. Just as it seems strange to think that the lines we've drawn between stars light-years apart from each other really resemble goats and fishes and that these same "random" space bodies, when directly between us and of these drawings, determine that we will have personality traits in some ways similar to goats and fishes. Trines, squares, and sextiles? You can't tell me that a grand trine between the Moon, Mars, and Pluto is an equilateral triangle in three-dimensional space.

That said, I am reminded of a line from a Paul Simon song- "The cross is in the ballpark- Why deny the obvious child?" I have tested astrology enough for myself to know that I have had dreams and experiences that are completely beyond rational explanation. As regards the purely intuitive faculty in human consciousness, I am convinced that...there is something there. Surely no astrology would continue to exist as long as it has if it did not in some way coincide with reality, and any astrology that had been in error for long enough would have to be revised in order to survive. I believe this has been going on for millenia, and I think writers like Liz Greene, Jeff Green, Steven Forrest, and Bil Tierney among others, are in the process of doing this.

So why do I mention these things in a review of this book? I have read some quality astrology, and I have read some New Age rubbish. I think that the conscience with which Steven Arroyo wrote this book is the closest that I have seen to being pure. Pure in the sense that IF one were hypothetically to accept astrology and all of the concepts involved in a typical chart as being true, THEN the conscience involved in delineating and explaining those concepts in a clear and rational way without giving in to tendencies to adhere to theoretical explanations that are thwarted by reality is sharper here than in any other introductory astrology book I have seen. I understand that the last sentence is a mouthful, but I truly MEAN it. That said, I don't really feel the need to say anything else EXCEPT that, although some of the ideas propounded by the reprinted cartoons (yes, there are cartoons in this book!) are in poor philosophical taste (polemical, sophist), others make their point cuttingly well.

Basically, if you have a skeptical but curious bent and are capable of suspending disbelief in favor of exploring a larger reality, there is no better book to begin exploring with than this one. And after you've read something atrocious, or find yourself half-believing something too magical to exist, remember that Stephen Arroyo wrote this.

This book has some advantages, such as its explanation of the elements and modalities and the two categories of house types, which provide a template for understanding and interpreting zodiac signs and houses that more "in depth" books can add to. I believe there is no explanation of planets by themselves, only in signs. These and other drawbacks should not prevent a beginning astrologer from using this simple reference.

This book contains mainly keywords and general directions to guide the reader what the planets, signs, houses and aspects mean in a broader sense. It may give novices introduction to astrology, but more advanced readers may not find the contents adequate for birth chart interpretation.