| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Awakening & Selected Short Stories by Kate Chopin: daughter was coming to stay with her aunts at Cote Joyeuse.
They talked about it, sipping their coffee on the ruined
portico. Mam'selle Pauline was terribly excited; the flush that
throbbed into her pale, nervous face showed it; and she locked her
thin fingers in and out incessantly.
"But what shall we do with La Petite, Sesoeur? Where shall we
put her? How shall we amuse her? Ah, Seigneur!"
"She will sleep upon a cot in the room next to ours,"
responded Ma'ame Pelagie, "and live as we do. She knows how we
live, and why we live; her father has told her. She knows we have
money and could squander it if we chose. Do not fret, Pauline; let
Awakening & Selected Short Stories |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fanny Herself by Edna Ferber: perhaps. And the two conspirators would read on, turning
the leaves softly and swiftly, gulping the pages, cramming
them down in an orgy of mental bolting, like naughty
children stuffing cake when their mother's back is turned.
But the very concentration of their dread of waking her
often brought about the feared result. Mrs. Brandeis would
start up rather wildly, look about her, and see the two
buried, red-cheeked and eager, in their books.
"Fanny! Theodore! Come now! Not another minute!"
Fanny, shameless little glutton, would try it again. "Just
to the end of this chapter! Just this weenty bit!"
Fanny Herself |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Moon-Face and Other Stories by Jack London: the only thing is not to die. They do not harm so long as one lives. But I do
wonder who smashed in that dog's head."
Light, however, was thrown upon this when a frightened housemaid brought the
news that Gaffer Bedshaw had that very morning, not more than an hour back,
gone violently insane, and was strapped down at home, in the huntsman's lodge,
where he raved of a battle with a ferocious and gigantic beast that he had
encountered in the Tichlorne pasture. He claimed that the thing, whatever it
was, was invisible, that with his own eyes he had seen that it was invisible;
wherefore his tearful wife and daughters shook their heads, and wherefore he
but waxed the more violent, and the gardener and the coachman tightened the
straps by another hole.
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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 Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: every single article in the room appeared to be saying either, "I,
too, am a Sobakevitch," or "I am exactly like Sobakevitch."
"I heard speak of you one day when I was visiting the President of the
Council," said Chichikov, on perceiving that no one else had a mind to
begin a conversation. "That was on Thursday last. We had a very
pleasant evening."
"Yes, on that occasion I was not there," replied Sobakevitch.
"What a nice man he is!"
"Who is?" inquired Sobakevitch, gazing into the corner by the stove.
"The President of the Local Council."
"Did he seem so to you? True, he is a mason, but he is also the
Dead Souls |
