| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Nana, Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille by Emile Zola: worse. People would have to fit in anyhow! The company were all on
their feet save Gaga and Rose and Bordenave, who alone took up two
armchairs. There was a buzz of voices, people talking in low tones
and stifling slight yawns the while.
"Now what d'you say, my lass," asked Bordenave, "to our sitting down
at table as if nothing had happened? We are all here, don't you
think?"
"Oh yes, we're all here, I promise you!" she answered laughingly.
She looked round her but grew suddenly serious, as though she were
surprised at not finding someone. Doubtless there was a guest
missing whom she did not mention. It was a case of waiting. But 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 Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: traveller being carefully kept out; no shady spot, no fruitful
plant being ever mentioned either; so that the whole performance
looks like a mere feat of agility on the part of a trained pen
running in a desert. A cruel spectacle--a most deplorable
adventure. "Life," in the words of an immortal thinker of, I
should say, bucolic origin, but whose perishable name is lost to
the worship of posterity--"life is not all beer and skittles."
Neither is the writing of novels. It isn't really. Je vous
donne ma parole d'honneur that it--is--not. Not all. I am thus
emphatic because some years ago, I remember, the daughter of a
general. . .
Some Reminiscences |
