| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tin Woodman of Oz by L. Frank Baum: medicine, I hurried away. It was a long distance,
mostly up hill, and my legs began to grow weary.
Without thinking what I was doing I said aloud: 'Dear
me; I wish I had twenty legs!' and in an instant I
became the unusual creature you see beside you. Twenty
legs! Twenty on one man! You may count them, if you
doubt my word."
"You've got 'em, all right," said Woot the Monkey,
who had already counted them.
"After I had delivered the magic medicine to the old
woman, I returned and tried to find the witch, or
The Tin Woodman of Oz |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde: then, and still suffer, is not for pen to write or paper to record.
My wife, always kind and gentle to me, rather than that I should
hear the news from indifferent lips, travelled, ill as she was, all
the way from Genoa to England to break to me herself the tidings of
so irreparable, so irremediable, a loss. Messages of sympathy
reached me from all who had still affection for me. Even people
who had not known me personally, hearing that a new sorrow had
broken into my life, wrote to ask that some expression of their
condolence should be conveyed to me. . . .
Three months go over. The calendar of my daily conduct and labour
that hangs on the outside of my cell door, with my name and
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: Written
Sep 1921-mid 1922
Published in six parts, February-July 1922
in Home Brew, Vol. 1, Nos. 1-6.
I. From The Dark
Published
Februrary 1922 in Home Brew Vol. 1, No. 1, p. 19-25.
Of Herbert
West, who was my friend in college and in after life, I can speak
only with extreme terror. This terror is not due altogether to
the sinister manner of his recent disappearance, but was engendered
Herbert West: Reanimator |
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 Ann Veronica by H. G. Wells: than most of his compatriots, and cooked it better, and Ramage,
with a fine perception of a feminine palate, ordered Vero Capri.
It was, Ann Veronica felt, as a sip or so of that remarkable
blend warmed her blood, just the sort of thing that her aunt
would not approve, to be lunching thus, tete-a-tete with a man;
and yet at the same time it was a perfectly innocent as well as
agreeable proceeding.
They talked across their meal in an easy and friendly manner
about Ann Veronica's affairs. He was really very bright and
clever, with a sort of conversational boldness that was just
within the limits of permissible daring. She described the
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