Today's Stichomancy for Vladimir Putin

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Hermione's Little Group of Serious Thinkers by Don Marquis:

O Spontaneity! Spontaneity! Rain is genius, Genius is rain! Fall, fall, rain!

Fothy is going to get them printed -- he knows a lot of vers libre publishers -- if Papa will only put up the money. And one nice thing about poor dear Papa is that he always will put it up.

So that night I wrote twenty or thirty more of them, and they were ALL good -- ALL works of genius -- they ALL came to me just like the first ones!

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan:

CHARLES. Oh, damn the Surname 'tis too formal to be register'd in Love's calendar--but now Careless beware--beware--we must have Beauty's superlative.

FIRST GENTLEMAN. Nay Never study[,] Careless--we'll stand to the Toast--tho' your mistress should want an eye--and you know you have a song will excuse you----

CARELESS. Egad so I have--and I'll give him the song instead of the Lady.----

SONG.--AND CHORUS--<4>

Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen; Here's to the widow of fifty;

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer:

Motionless, we sat in that humid darkness and listened.

Something was moving beneath the stones of the cellar. I held my breath; every nerve in my body was strung up.

A line of light showed a few feet from where we lay. It widened--became an oblong. A trap was lifted, and within a yard of me, there rose a dimly seen head. Horror I had expected--and death, or worse. Instead, I saw a lovely face, crowned with a disordered mass of curling hair; I saw a white arm upholding the stone slab, a shapely arm clasped about the elbow by a broad gold bangle.

The girl climbed into the cellar and placed the lantern on the stone floor.

The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu

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 1984 by George Orwell:

down, thass what I say. Get it up while it's fresh on your stomach, like.'

She revived, turned to have another look at Winston and seemed immediately to take a fancy to him. She put a vast arm round his shoulder and drew him towards her, breathing beer and vomit into his face.

'Wass your name, dearie?' she said.

'Smith,' said Winston.

'Smith?' said the woman. 'Thass funny. My name's Smith too. Why,' she added sentimentally, 'I might be your mother!'

She might, thought Winston, be his mother. She was about the right age and physique, and it was probable that people changed somewhat after twenty years in a forced-labour camp.

1984