| 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: noticed about him was his beautiful, crinkly, snow-white beard.
I once heard a missionary say it was like the beard of an
Arabian sheik. His bald crown only made it more impressive.
Grandfather's eyes were not at all like those of an old man;
they were bright blue, and had a fresh, frosty sparkle.
His teeth were white and regular--so sound that he had never
been to a dentist in his life. He had a delicate skin,
easily roughened by sun and wind. When he was a young man
his hair and beard were red; his eyebrows were still coppery.
As we sat at the table, Otto Fuchs and I kept stealing covert glances
at each other. Grandmother had told me while she was getting supper
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum: "He must have run away," replied Dorothy. "I wonder who he was?"
"I think," said Gugu the King, who was the fat Woman, "that the
Goose was the stranger who proposed that we make war upon the Oz
people. If so, his transformation was merely a trick to deceive us,
and he has now gone to join his comrade, that wicked Li-Mon-Eag who
obeyed all his commands."
"What shall we do now?" asked Dorothy. "Shall we go back to the
Emerald City, as we are, and then visit Glinda the Good and ask her to
break the enchantments?"
"I think so," replied the Wizard Fox. "And we can take Gugu the
King with us, and have Glinda restore him to his natural shape. But I
The Magic of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde: husband told you, and sent you to decoy me back. [Crosses L.]
MRS. ERLYNNE. [R.C.] Your husband has never seen the letter. I -
saw it, I opened it. I - read it.
LADY WINDERMERE. [Turning to her.] You opened a letter of mine to
my husband? You wouldn't dare!
MRS. ERLYNNE. Dare! Oh! to save you from the abyss into which you
are falling, there is nothing in the world I would not dare,
nothing in the whole world. Here is the letter. Your husband has
never read it. He never shall read it. [Going to fireplace.] It
should never have been written. [Tears it and throws it into the
fire.]
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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 Night and Day by Virginia Woolf: impression," he continued eagerly, turning and linking his arm through
Denham's, as though to prevent him from escaping; and, thus compelled,
Denham passed the monitory lamp-post, to which, in passing, he
breathed an excuse, for how could he break away when Rodney's arm was
actually linked in his? "You must not think that I have any bitterness
against her--far from it. It's not altogether her fault, poor girl.
She lives, you know, one of those odious, self-centered lives--at
least, I think them odious for a woman--feeding her wits upon
everything, having control of everything, getting far too much her own
way at home--spoilt, in a sense, feeling that every one is at her
feet, and so not realizing how she hurts--that is, how rudely she
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