| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence: united in labour. He liked to watch his fellow-clerks at work.
The man was the work and the work was the man, one thing, for the
time being. It was different with the girls. The real woman
never seemed to be there at the task, but as if left out, waiting.
From the train going home at night he used to watch the lights
of the town, sprinkled thick on the hills, fusing together in a blaze
in the valleys. He felt rich in life and happy. Drawing farther off,
there was a patch of lights at Bulwell like myriad petals shaken
to the ground from the shed stars; and beyond was the red glare
of the furnaces, playing like hot breath on the clouds.
He had to walk two and more miles from Keston home,
Sons and Lovers |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: "Under God--it did," he exclaimed fervently. "It was by a special mercy,
I firmly believe, that it stood some of those hurricane squalls."
"It was the setting of that sail which--" I began.
"God's own hand in it," he interrupted me. "Nothing less could have done it.
I don't mind telling you that I hardly dared give the order.
It seemed impossible that we could touch anything without losing it,
and then our last hope would have been gone."
The terror of that gale was on him yet. I let him go on for a bit,
then said, casually--as if returning to a minor subject:
"You were very anxious to give up your mate to the shore people, I believe?"
He was. To the law. His obscure tenacity on that point had in it
The Secret Sharer |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from In the Cage by Henry James: Lady Bradeen, all but named out, had popped straight up; and she
practically betrayed her consciousness by waiting a little before
she rejoined: "Cleverer than who?"
"Well, if I wasn't afraid you'd think I swagger, I should say--than
anybody! If you leave your place there, where shall you go?" he
more gravely asked.
"Oh too far for you ever to find me!"
"I'd find you anywhere."
The tone of this was so still more serious that she had but her one
acknowledgement. "I'd do anything for you--I'd do anything for
you," she repeated. She had already, she felt, said it all; so
|
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 'Twixt Land & Sea by Joseph Conrad: her body. That black, fixed stare into which I had read a tragic
meaning more than once, in which I had found a sombre seduction,
was perfectly empty now, void of all consciousness whatever, and
not even aware any longer of my presence; it had become a little
sleepy, in the Jacobus fashion.
But, man being a perverse animal, instead of rejoicing at my
complete success, I beheld it with astounded and indignant eyes.
There was something cynical in that unconcealed alteration, the
true Jacobus shamelessness. I felt as though I had been cheated in
some rather complicated deal into which I had entered against my
better judgment. Yes, cheated without any regard for, at least,
'Twixt Land & Sea |
