| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Beast in the Jungle by Henry James: and doom. They had parted for ever in that strange talk; access to
her chamber of pain, rigidly guarded, was almost wholly forbidden
him; he was feeling now moreover, in the face of doctors, nurses,
the two or three relatives attracted doubtless by the presumption
of what she had to "leave," how few were the rights, as they were
called in such cases, that he had to put forward, and how odd it
might even seem that their intimacy shouldn't have given him more
of them. The stupidest fourth cousin had more, even though she had
been nothing in such a person's life. She had been a feature of
features in HIS, for what else was it to have been so
indispensable? Strange beyond saying were the ways of existence,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories by Alice Dunbar: LITTLE MISS SOPHIE
When Miss Sophie knew consciousness again, the long, faint,
swelling notes of the organ were dying away in distant echoes
through the great arches of the silent church, and she was alone,
crouching in a little, forsaken black heap at the altar of the
Virgin. The twinkling tapers shone pityingly upon her, the
beneficent smile of the white-robed Madonna seemed to whisper
comfort. A long gust of chill air swept up the aisles, and Miss
Sophie shivered not from cold, but from nervousness.
But darkness was falling, and soon the lights would be lowered,
and the great massive doors would be closed; so, gathering her
The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft: were found. We also refrained from showing the more puzzling of
the scarred bones and greenish soapstones; while Danforth and
I have closely guarded the pictures we took or drew on the superplateau
across the range, and the crumpled things we smoothed, studied
in terror, and brought away in our pockets.
But now that Starkweather-Moore
party is organizing, and with a thoroughness far beyond anything
our outfit attempted. If not dissuaded, they will get to the innermost
nucleus of the antarctic and melt and bore till they bring up
that which we know may end the world. So I must break through
all reticences at last - even about that ultimate, nameless thing
At the Mountains of Madness |
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 Reminiscences of Tolstoy by Leo Tolstoy: Being wholly in agreement with my sister's views, I will
merely supplement them with the words uttered by his brother,
Nikolái Nikoláyevitch, who said that
"Turgénieff cannot reconcile himself to the idea that
Lyovótchka is growing up and freeing himself from his
tutelage."
As a matter of fact, when Turgénieff was already a
famous writer, no one had ever heard of Tolstoy, and, as Fet
expressed it, there was only "something said about his stories from
'Childhood.'"
I can imagine with what secret veneration a young writer, just
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