| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Pupil by Henry James: time where he was. Wasn't it another proof of the success with
which those patrons practised their arts that they had managed to
avert for so long the illuminating flash? It descended on our
friend with a breadth of effect which perhaps would have struck a
spectator as comical, after he had returned to his little servile
room, which looked into a close court where a bare dirty opposite
wall took, with the sound of shrill clatter, the reflexion of
lighted back windows. He had simply given himself away to a band
of adventurers. The idea, the word itself, wore a romantic horror
for him - he had always lived on such safe lines. Later it assumed
a more interesting, almost a soothing, sense: it pointed a moral,
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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 Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart: murdered?"
"It was stormy. Thomas says once or twice he almost broke into
the room, he was so alarmed for Louise."
"Another thing, Halsey," I said, "have you ever heard Louise
mention a woman named Carrington, Nina Carrington?"
"Never," he said positively.
For try as we would, our thoughts always came back to that fatal
Saturday night, and the murder. Every conversational path led to
it, and we all felt that Jamieson was tightening the threads of
evidence around John Bailey. The detective's absence was hardly
reassuring; he must have had something to work on in town, or he
The Circular Staircase |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Georgics by Virgil: Have changed their courses, and the sky-god now,
Wet with the south-wind, thickens what was rare,
And what was gross releases, then, too, change
Their spirits' fleeting phases, and their breasts
Feel other motions now, than when the wind
Was driving up the cloud-rack. Hence proceeds
That blending of the feathered choirs afield,
The cattle's exultation, and the rooks'
Deep-throated triumph.
But if the headlong sun
And moons in order following thou regard,
Georgics |
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 Sarrasine by Honore de Balzac: searched your whole being with this blade, should I find there any
sentiment to blot out, anything with which to satisfy my thirst for
vengeance? You are nothing! If you were a man or a woman, I would kill
you, but--'
"Sarrasine made a gesture of disgust, and turned his face away;
thereupon he noticed the statue.
" 'And that is a delusion!' he cried.
"Then, turning to Zambinella once more, he continued:
" 'A woman's heart was to me a place of refuge, a fatherland. Have you
sisters who resemble you? No. Then die! But no, you shall live. To
leave you your life is to doom you to a fate worse than death. I
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