| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from My Antonia by Willa Cather: It was a beautiful blue morning. The buffalo-peas were blooming
in pink and purple masses along the roadside, and the larks,
perched on last year's dried sunflower stalks, were singing
straight at the sun, their heads thrown back and their yellow
breasts a-quiver. The wind blew about us in warm, sweet gusts.
We rode slowly, with a pleasant sense of Sunday indolence.
We found the Shimerdas working just as if it were a week-day. Marek was
cleaning out the stable, and Antonia and her mother were making garden,
off across the pond in the draw-head. Ambrosch was up on the windmill tower,
oiling the wheel. He came down, not very cordially. When Jake asked
for the collar, he grunted and scratched his head. The collar belonged
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Ruling Passion by Henry van Dyke: river. Then I travel, travel, travel through the woods, how many
days I know not, till I come here. No one knows me. I give myself
the name Tremblay. I make the music for them. With my violin I
live. I am happy. I forget. But it all returns to me--now--at the
last. I have murdered. Is there a forgiveness for me, mon pere?"
The priest's face had changed very swiftly at the mention of the
camp on the St. Maurice. As the story went on, he grew strangely
excited. His lips twitched. His hands trembled. At the end he
sank on his knees, close by the bed, and looked into the countenance
of the sick man, searching it as a forester searches in the undergrowth
for a lost trail. Then his eyes lighted up as he found it.
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Rezanov by Gertrude Atherton: mony to the Nadeshda and I was politely told to
leave.
"But the mortification was the least of my wor-
ries. The object of the embassy was to establish not
only good will and friendship between Russia and
Japan, for which we cared little, but commercial
intercourse between this fertile country and our
northeastern and barren possessions. It would have
been greatly to the advantage of the Japanese, and
God knows it would have meant much to us."
Then Rezanov having tickled the imaginations
Rezanov |
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 Rezanov by Gertrude Atherton: "I am glad she will not dance with Weeliam,"
muttered Santiago. "I love him--yes; but the
Spanish dance is not for the Bostonian."
Rezanov awaited her performance with an in-
terest that caused him some cynical amusement.
But in a moment he had surrendered to her once
more as a creature of inexhaustible surprise. The
musicians, watching her, began to play more slowly.
Concha, her arms still supine, her head lifted, her
eyes half veiled, began to dance in a stately and
measured fashion that seemed to powder her hair
Rezanov |
