| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: was happy and proud like a peacock on a rail.
His self-esteem was, indeed, the one joint in his harness.
He could be got to work, and even kept at work, by flattery.
As long as my wife stood over him, crying out how strong he
was, so long exactly he would stick to the matter in hand;
and the moment she turned her back, or ceased to praise him,
he would stop. His physical strength was wonderful; and to
have a woman stand by and admire his achievements, warmed his
heart like sunshine. Yet he was as cowardly as he was
powerful, and felt no shame in owning to the weakness.
Something was once wanted from the crazy platform over the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Chouans by Honore de Balzac: them. This silence, a proof either of respect or contempt, as the case
might be; the quantity of baggage belonging to the lady, whom the
commandant sneeringly called "the princess"; everything, even to the
clothes of her attendant squire, stirred Hulot's bile. The dress of
the unknown man was a good specimen of the fashions of the day then
being caricatured as "incroyable,"--unbelievable, unless seen. Imagine
a person trussed up in a coat, the front of which was so short that
five or six inches of the waistcoat came below it, while the skirts
were so long that they hung down behind like the tail of a cod,--the
term then used to describe them. An enormous cravat was wound about
his neck in so many folds that the little head which protruded from
The Chouans |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: Nice decent hard-working people like the Jonderquists!"
In her batiste nightgown she was standing at the bureau
engaged in the invariable rites of wishing that she had a real
dressing-table with a triple mirror, of bending toward the
streaky glass and raising her chin to inspect a pin-head mole
on her throat, and finally of brushing her hair. In rhythm to
the strokes she went on:
"But, Will, there isn't any of what you might call financial
rivalry between you and the partners--Westlake and McGanum
--is there?"
He flipped into bed with a solemn back-somersault and a
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The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: people played polo and were rich together. This was a permanent move,
said Daisy over the telephone, but I didn't believe it--I had no sight
into Daisy's heart, but I felt that Tom would drift on forever seeking,
a little wistfully, for the dramatic turbulence of some irrecoverable
football game.
And so it happened that on a warm windy evening I drove over to East
Egg to see two old friends whom I scarcely knew at all. Their house was
even more elaborate than I expected, a cheerful red-and-white Georgian
Colonial mansion, overlooking the bay. The lawn started at the beach
and ran toward the front door for a quarter of a mile, jumping over
sun-dials and brick walks and burning gardens--finally when it reached
The Great Gatsby |
