Inspirations for In Our Stars -Kate Madsen
If you are like me (and I know I am), you love stories . . .
Does it matter if astrology is “real?”
"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution." –Albert Einstein
With a background in both theater and astrology—which I’ll describe below for those who are interested—a fun little personal hobby of mine was identifying the signs of main characters in books, films, and television, and journaling about the archetypes they represent. Over time, I began to notice many interesting patterns.
During that time, I learned that J.K. Rowling* studied astrology and learned to read charts while developing the character of Professor Trelawney, the Divination teacher in the Harry Potter series, played with skill and joy by Emma Thompson. Rowling said that she finds astrology all “highly amusing.”
“He pointed a finger at the sky.
‘What?’ said Robin, looking up into the blue haze.
‘If you look carefully,’ said Strike, ‘you might just see an asteroid passing through the house of bollocks.”―Robert Galbraith (Rowling), Troubled Blood
Then I found, quite by accident, a reading Rowling had done for someone with a Leo Rising. Hmmm. I always thought her character, Robin Ellacott, had a Leo Rising. Robin is a main character in the mystery series by Robert Galbraith (AKA Jo Rowling). Was this a coincidence? We know Rowling knew a lot about Leo Rising.
That led me to guess and to draw up charts of the Big Three Signs for her main characters, based on their development throughout the first four books.
Nerd hobbies, amirite?
ASIDE: When the next season of C.B. Strike comes around in 2026, I’ll include their charts in a review.
Troubled Blood
Fast forward to the 5th book in the series, Trouble Blood, coming out.
This book features a detective who suffered from hyperthyroidism and psychosis and used astrology (tarot, etc) to try to solve a murder inquiry. Robin Ellacott and Cormoron Strike are trying to decipher his conclusions because it was a very cold case, and he did all the original interviews.
In the story, Robin believes his method was very intuitive and continues to peruse the journal for clues and descriptions of the people involved. Strike feels it’s all hogwash, but also thinks the truth might be buried in it because the man was a good detective.
Rowling’s extensive knowledge of astrology was very impressive. I was having a blast reading this book.
Then suddenly, Robin and Strike were discussing their own signs. My mouth dropped open. Strike’s mother had done his chart, and so it was all there.
I have avoided focusing on their birthdays, not knowing that Rowling would have chosen them intentionally. Now I found the information and drew the charts.
It turned out, I got it on the nose with the charts I had drawn strictly from character. Robin’s time of birth is missing, but with that Leo Rising, it all came together. Everything she does aligns with a chart with a Leo Rising. Start with combining Robin’s sunny hair, her genius at playing undercover roles, and her bravery.
“Sometimes, acting as though you’re all right makes you all right. Sometimes you’ve got to slap on a brave face and walk out into the world, and after a while, it isn’t an act anymore, it’s who you are. If I’d waited to feel ready to leave my room after—you know,” she said, “I’d still be in there. I had to leave before I was ready.”
― Robin Ellacott, Robert Galbraith, Lethal White
I won’t spoil it, but astrology does help the detectives solve the case, although in an unexpected way.
This experience taught me that all this is less subjective than it seems. It’s based on fundamental cultural archetypes we all carry within us and recognize in stories. Rowling knew them, and I recognized them.
I began to realize how valuable a deeper knowledge of astrology can be for writers, directors, and actors. Astrology is an archetype, myth, and fantasy; when I say that, it does not mean I am saying it is not true. It is true, as all great art is true.
J.K. Rowling Interview
Q: Do you see death as the end of everything?
No. I lead an intensely spiritual life, and even though I don’t have a terribly clear and structured idea about it, I do believe that after you die, some part of you stays alive, some way or other. I believe in something like the indestructible soul. But for that subject, we should reserve about six hours: It’s something I struggle with a lot.Q: `Do things go the way they are destined, or do you make your own choices?
I believe in free will. Of those that, like us, are in a privileged situation at least. For you, for me; people who are living in western society, people who are not repressed, who are free. We can choose. The things go largely like you want them to go. You control your own life. Your own will is extremely powerful. The way I write about professor Trelawney the particularly inadequate divination teacher, say a lot about how I think about destiny. I did a lot of research into astrology for her character. I found it all highly amusing, but I don’t believe in it.—Jo Rowling, The Leaky Cauldron, 2007
*BOUNDARIES
I love to argue politics. For sure. See me on Bluesky to do that. (@vardassky) But I do not want to get into the politics surrounding J.K. Rowling in this context, for the same reason I don’t want to argue about whether astrology is real or whether anyone who believes in it is delusional. It’s not the subject at hand.
Another time perhaps. I’ll write a post about whether you can separate an author’s work and support for that work from her opinions on politics at a later date, and we can debate that. I don’t want In Our Stars to become all about those things.
The next part is all biography, meant to show you where my expertise lies in writing about all this. If you don’t care, now’s the time to bounce.
Let’s Talk About Me Now, Shall We?
Theater
You thought I was going to talk about Leo Rising more once you read that headline, didn’t you? I don’t have one, mathematically, at least.
I became an actor and director after studying at the now-defunct Performing Arts Foundation (PAF) Playhouse Conservatory in New York, under the leadership of Artistic Director Joseph Brocket.
Brocket was a former theater professor at Northwestern University. I joined the PAF apprentice program after being cast in some children’s theater productions and eventually became a member of the Arts-as-Education theater company.
PAF was known for premiering new plays, such as Voices by Richard Lortz, starring Julie Harris, and The Halloween Bandit by Mark Medoff. I got to be a “Gopher” in those rehearsals (Go for this, Go for that) and sometimes handle props backstage, so I could eavesdrop and learn from all that glorious script doctoring.
Actors Julie Harris and Jose Ferrer, as well as singer-songwriter Harry Chapin, served on the board of PAF Playhouse and brought in professors from NYU to train the company and its students, including me.
At PAF’s Children’s Theater, I was consistently cast in archetypal roles, such as The Ice Queen in The Snow Queen and The Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz. I played both Penelope and Circe in The Odyssey.
Teaching & Writing
Meanwhile, I worked in schools as a director and artist-in-residence for about 7 years. After working in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, for a theater season, I moved to Denver.
For another 7 years in Denver, I worked with several semi-professional theater companies as an actor and director, won Best Actress and Best Director once each, and earned several additional nominations. For a few years, I was the dramaturge for the Hunger Artist Ensemble. I also played Hecate in Macbeth at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. Archetypes are my jam, so to speak.
After that, I taught English, high school theater, and visual art for another couple of decades, and then became an education writer and voiceover actor.
Amateur Astrologer
New Thought Astrology was my childhood religion. When my baby brother died of heart failure, my mother (a high school reading and ELA teacher) lost faith in her mother’s Protestantism and her father’s Masonic tradition and went searching for her own meaning.
She studied metaphysics (and astrology) with Ann Hale, a direct student of the theosophist-astrologer Alice Bailey. Our house was filled with hundreds of books on astrology and philosophy, as well as hundreds of classic and modern novels.
My mother (Ginny Somers) did readings for friends and family. She was a spiritual counselor at the Science of Mind churches she attended. I remember being quizzed on the finer points of Dane Rudhyar's Humanistic Astrology.
My opposites-attract parents were divorced, and my father’s house was filled with history, science, and political science books.
I read them all. I was the daughter of a reading teacher, after all. I read The Over-Soul by Ralph Waldo Emerson when I was ten! A year later, I read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany by William L. Shirer
I also took astrology classes starting at age 15. I drew all types of natal, progressed, solar, lunar charts, etc, etc. I made art from people’s charts as gifts. I gave readings for friends and family. I studied it, practiced it, and believed in it; for 30 years, I was all in.
As I mentioned above, I attended a theater conservatory immediately after high school, but I didn’t return to university for my degree until I was 30. When I got my BFA in college and double-majored in Behavioral Science — shifting over to my father’s sphere of influence — my relationship with astrology changed.
“Behavioral Science” encompasses psychology, sociology, economics, anthropology, and history. My favorite class was Religious Anthropology, and within that class, I began to meld my worlds.
I began to see the zodiac as I do now — as building blocks of mythological stories that have shaped all our storytelling and understanding of psychology (through Carl Jung) throughout history.
I also began studying Buddhism and Taoism, not as religions but as philosophies and practices.
I would not say I struggle with astrology and the journey of the soul, or even the existence of a soul, like Rowling said she does—or did. I would say I am at peace with it now. What I know, and what I believe in above all else, is story. I believe in story.
I hope that both those who believe in astrology and those who don’t will find enjoyment and meaning here, without needing to convert anyone to their own view or mocking them for their own.
