Today's Stichomancy for James Joyce

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Pellucidar by Edgar Rice Burroughs:

back with me from the inner world--the ugly Mahar that Hooja the Sly One had substituted for my dear Dian at the moment of my departure--filled them with wonder and with awe.

Nor less so did the mighty subterranean prospector which had carried me to Pellucidar and back again, and which lay out in the desert about two miles from my camp.

With their help I managed to get the unwieldy tons of its great bulk into a vertical position--the nose deep in a hole we had dug in the sand and the rest of it

Pellucidar

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens:

sustaining a charge in the narrow passages in which they were so closely wedged together, the throng poured out as impetuously as they had flocked in. As the whole stream turned at once, Barnaby and Hugh went with it: and so, fighting and struggling and trampling on fallen men and being trampled on in turn themselves, they and the whole mass floated by degrees into the open street, where a large detachment of the Guards, both horse and foot, came hurrying up; clearing the ground before them so rapidly that the people seemed to melt away as they advanced.

The word of command to halt being given, the soldiers formed across the street; the rioters, breathless and exhausted with their late

Barnaby Rudge

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz by L. Frank Baum:

billows, through which little tongues of flame constantly shot up. Just above them, and almost on a level with their platform, were banks of rolling clouds which constantly shifted position and changed color. The blues and greys were very beautiful, and Dorothy noticed that on the cloud banks sat or reclined fleecy, shadowy forms of beautiful beings who must have been the Cloud Fairies. Mortals who stand upon the earth and look up at the sky cannot often distinguish these forms, but our friends were now so near to the clouds that they observed the dainty fairies very clearly.

"Are they real?" asked Zeb, in an awed voice.

"Of course," replied Dorothy, softly. "They are the Cloud Fairies."

Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz

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 The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare:

And be it moon, or sun, or what you please; And if you please to call it a rush-candle, Henceforth I vow it shall be so for me.

PETRUCHIO. I say it is the moon.

KATHERINA. I know it is the moon.

PETRUCHIO. Nay, then you lie; it is the blessed sun.

KATHERINA. Then, God be bless'd, it is the blessed sun;

The Taming of the Shrew