Melancholia, which has a period of 3 years, 78 days, was discovered on October 12, 1977 by Paul Wild at Zimmerwald, Switzerland. He named it for "One of the four humors or human temperaments [the ancients believed in]. The gloom besetting astronomers when the sky remains overcast for weeks on end." (Minor Planet Circular 30097)
This is a pretty good description of Melancholia's astrological character: melancholy.
"Gloom, despair, and agony on me."
(The poem linked to is not the lyrics to the song from the classic "Hee Haw" skit. Use the back button to return to this page.)
Bret Easton Ellis (born March 7, 1964, in Los Angeles), has vividly depicted meaningless lives filled with empty pleasures and meaningless relationships amid the glitter of modern America in his novels and attempted to establish a link between fashion and terrorism in one, Glamorama. His best-known catchphrase is the final line of his most famous novel, American Psycho: "This is not an exit." (There is no escape from hell.) Ellis has Melancholia semisquare Juno (relationships) and sextile Neptune (imagination).
British mathematician and computer pioneer Alan Turing, who famously and tragically killed himself by eating an apple laced with cyanide after being prosecuted under Britain's now-repealed sodomy law, had Melancholia square Pallas (politics) and Agamemnon (attacked in his own home, as it were), trine the Sun (to shine) and quincunx Nessus (criminality).
Virginia Woolf, who struggled with depression throughout her life and ended up drowning herself, had Melancholia sextile Uranus and Chiron, quintile Saturn (hard work) and Vesta(intensity, commitment), quincunx Mercury (thoughts, writings), and opposite Chaos. Her dark turn of mind is reflected in her work.
Karen Carpenter, whose tragic 1983 death from anorexia still casts a pall over The Carpenters' song catalog and makes playing the otherwise fine wedding song "We've Only Just Begun" a somewhat risky proposition, had Melancholia in the third house, on the IC, quincunx Venus (singing, looking attractive) and contraparallel Neptune (music, delusions).
Ozzy Osbourne has Melancholia quincunx Venus also, and sesquiquadrate Ceres (nurturance, family).
Kurt Cobain also had Melancholia on the IC, but on the fourth-house side, sextile Damocles (to challenge, drastic change), square Mercury and the Ascendant, and trine Heracles (to strive with). His unstable, traumatic early life left a mark on him that overshadowed the rest of his life and eventually overwhelmed him. His music, even his unkempt appearance and ragged thrift-store clothing, was very influential.
Patsy Cline, a Fifties country singer whose life was also very tragic, marked by scandal and trauma, and who died young in a plane crash, had Melancholia in the eleventh house of love received, conjunct Asbolus (terrible experiences), sextile Don Quixote (taking on the system), quintile Pluto (self-damaging, unforgettable, mass appeal), square Cruithne(one's roots), trine Ceres, and opposite Heracles.
The glyph for Melancholia is mine.