| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber: opened the girls swarmed on it. Those that didn't understand
baseball pretended they did. When the team was out of town our
form of greeting was changed from, "Good-morning!" or "Howdy-do!"
to "What's the score?" Every night the results of the games
throughout the league were posted up on the blackboard in front of
Schlager's hardware store, and to see the way in which the crowd
stood around it, and streamed across the street toward it, you'd
have thought they were giving away gas stoves and hammock couches.
Going home in the street car after the game the girls used to
gaze adoringly at the dirty faces of their sweat-begrimed heroes,
and then they'd rush home, have supper, change their dresses, do
Buttered Side Down |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Gobseck by Honore de Balzac: desired to be alone in the Count's room.
" 'Do not go in,' he said; and I admired the child for his tone and
gesture; 'she is praying there.'
"Gobseck began to laugh that soundless laugh of his, but I felt too
much touched by the feeling in Ernest's little face to join in the
miser's sardonic amusement. When Ernest saw that we moved towards the
door, he planted himself in front of it, crying out, 'Mamma, here are
some gentlemen in black who want to see you.!'
"Gobseck lifted Ernest out of the way as if the child had been a
feather, and opened the door.
"What a scene it was that met our eyes! The room was in frightful
Gobseck |
