Marilyn Monroe: A Lilith For Modern Times (Part 2)

Young Norma Jean was barely out of her teens when this photo was taken.

It doesn’t matter how long it takes. It matters whose taking you.
– My favorite line of Marilyn’s from her 1959 film “Some Like It Hot”.


This article on Marilyn Monroe is my way of commemorating the upcoming Venus Occultation of the Sun on June 6, 2012. When Venus shows her hidden, or occult side, we see more than a little of the mysterious Lilith uncovered…but we also see Venus in all of her glory.



FIXED STARS ALL OVER THE MAP…

The striking fixed-star features of Marilyn’s natal chart jumped out at me – she had four planets conjunct fixed stars within a one degree orb, and Black Moon Lilith partile conjunct the royal star Regulus. Her Sun was conjunct another royal but unfortunate star, Aldebaran.

With the exception of her Sun, her other four star conjunctions were all generational, and would have affected everyone born in the months or even years on either side of her birth. What comes to mind is Robert Hand’s remark that the fixed stars can raise one to a great height, and then just as suddenly drop one from that height. It occurred to me that a huge number of young men born in 1926 would have died during WWII, and many young women as well, and I can’t help but wonder if those fixed stars positions might not have somehow influenced that outcome.

Marilyn's measurements have always been a subject of intense speculation. She had a true fertility-goddess figure - a bust that was likely a 36D or a 38D in old-fashioned bra sizes and a waist that was likely size 6 or size 8, with voluptuous hips. Many of her film-set dresses were skin tight and molded onto her body.



QUICK RECAP OF THE MEANING OF THOSE FIXED STARS

SIRIUS (14 Cancer 05 – Tightly conjunct Marilyn’s Pluto – 13 Cancer 23) - Aspiration, self-importance, celebrity, leadership, emotional.

ALPHA SERPENTIS (22 Scorpio 04 – Tightly conjunct Marilyn’s Saturn – 21 Scorpio 26) - Achievements marred by difficulty, emotional instability, difficulties with relationships.

SCHEAT (29 Pisces 22 – Tightly conjunct Marilyn’s Uranus – 28 Pisces 59) – I call this the “shit” star. It is prone to melancholy, and gives connections to crime. Endless enthusiasm for the matters connected to the star, but no ultimate fulfillment.

REGULUS (29 Leo 53 – Partile conjunct Marilyn’s Lilith) – Ambitious, dignified, gracious, but possible downfall. Connected to matters of high status and leadership.

ALDEBARAN (9 Gem 47 – Tightly conjunct Marilyn’s Sun – 10 Gemini 26) – Success and popularity, but also suggests danger, violence, and an intemperate spirit.

Supposedly, Marilyn wasn't all that proud of doing naked pictures early in her career, but they remain the favorites of a younger generation of fans.

SATURN WAS THE FOCAL POINT OF HER HOROSCOPE…

So we would expect the qualities of Alpha Serpentis to show up strongly, and they do. The movie, “My Week With Marilyn” did a great job of showing Marilyn’s emotional instability. Despite an adoring public, she did have trouble with so many of her personal relationships – her mother, her absent or unknown father, her three husbands and numerous lovers, and her demanding co-stars. “My Week With Marilyn” made it clear that her co-star Lawrence Olivier wanted more from her than he was ever willing to give in return.

The film also did a good job of showing how learning lines was excruciatingly painful for her. Marilyn had strong intuitive intelligence but a lot of contemporaries remarked that she wasn’t the sharpest crayon in the box, although she did know how to “make do” with what she did have. “Achievements marred by difficulty” seems an apt summation, and her natal Mercury was combust, which couldn’t have made things any easier.

SCHEAT, THE “SHIT” STAR

Uranus was tightly conjunct Scheat during the entire summer of 1926. This was particularly hard on little girls born this summer, because Uranus represents masculine energy and the men in a young girl’s life. Monroe suffered one or more sexual assaults in childhood, and she was connected to the Mafia as she grew older. Other little girls would have been born to families with fathers, uncles, and brothers involved in bootlegging during the Prohibition years.

Ebertin mentions the following:

“(Scheat) Tied up with ‘malefics’, this could lead the native to lose his life in catastrophes, such as floods, shipwreck, mining accidents, airplane accidents, or maybe suicide.”

Scheat is said to give endless enthusiasm for a certain subject even though success is never at hand. Marilyn had it conjunct her 8th House Uranus, and a number of her films show her going after a man for his money. In real life, Monroe didn’t need to do this once she got past adolescence, and projected the energy in a humorous way in her films instead.

WHAT A DIVA!

Monroe was known for having a temper and for “losing it” hysterically, on a bad day. Her husband Arthur Miller recalled an argument when she became so angry that she dumped him by the side of the road in an empty desert. People who worked for her frequently decided it wasn’t worth the humiliation…usually after she had already fired them.

That said, Monroe was on the record against red-baiting and for black equality – her ideals were directed toward large groups on an impersonal level – a textbook description of natal Moon and Jupiter in Aquarius.

THE GENIUS AND THE GODDESS

Marilyn and Arthur Miller, her gentle "Hottie" with glasses

This is the title of a book by Jeffery Meyer about Marilyn’s third marriage to Arthur Miller. The reviewer, Mark Gould, talked about their strong ‘chemistry’ and how each wanted to enter the other’s world – he wanted to write film scripts; she wanted to act on stage. He notes that Monroe was drawn by Miller’s gentleness, and because she believed he could teach and protect her (Chiron on her MC). Also, Miller never hit her, and her second husband Joe DiMaggio did. Although in her own words, “Joe never beat me without good reason.” (Talk about Chiron on the MC…!)

Gould also notes that “The Genius and the Goddess” is a familiar archetype for other famous couples - Oprah Winfrey and Stedman Graham come to mind. A poignant description of Miller and Monroe’s marriage is available online as an extract from Christopher Bigsby’s biography below:

Marilyn Monroe and Arthur Miller's Marriage

Before Miller, there was Joe DiMaggio. It was an iconic marriage in its own right – biographers of DiMaggio like to insist that Marilyn was not in love with DiMaggio when she married him, but that she fell in love with him after divorcing him, and was not only looking back on her marriage to him fondly at the end of her life, but that they would have gotten back together had she lived.

Their "chemistry" is the first thing you notice in this photo.

It is certainly true that DiMaggio and Monroe had more in common than Miller and Monroe did – they were both 10th grade high school drop-outs and enormous idols living inside the “hero machine” – he was a folk hero and living legend, and she was the most publicized, swiftly rising movie star in history.

A sensitive portrait of Monroe and DiMaggio’s marriage which also includes some fascinating material on why J. Edgar Hoover may have hated her as much as he did John Kennedy, and how he may have successfully twisted public opinion to blame Kennedy for Monroe’s death is found below:

Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio's Marriage

Before Joe DiMaggio, there was her four year long teen-age marriage, with its echoes of the marriage between Venus and Hephaestus. Jim Dougherty finally has his say below:

Jim Dougherty remembers Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn's fleshy, natural beauty is such a refreshing contrast from the skinny Hollywood starlets of today, with their gym-buffed arms and giraffe necks.