| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Herbert West: Reanimator by H. P. Lovecraft: our materials in a dense strip of woods between the house and
the potter’s field. If, on the other hand, he could be restored,
our fame would be brilliantly and perpetually established. So
without delay West had injected into the body’s wrist the compound
which would hold it fresh for use after my arrival. The matter
of the presumably weak heart, which to my mind imperilled the
success of our experiment, did not appear to trouble West extensively.
He hoped at last to obtain what he had never obtained before --
a rekindled spark of reason and perhaps a normal, living creature.
So on the night of July 18, 1910, Herbert West and I stood in
the cellar laboratory and gazed at a white, silent figure beneath
Herbert West: Reanimator |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Dream Life and Real Life by Olive Schreiner: not a rose to be bought for love or money. Only in the garden of a friend
of mine, in a sunny corner between the oven and the brick wall, there was a
rose tree growing which had on it one bud. It was white, and it had been
promised to the fair haired girl to wear at the party.
The evening came; when I arrived and went to the waiting-room, to take off
my mantle, I found the girl there already. She was dressed in pure white,
with her great white arms and shoulders showing, and her bright hair
glittering in the candle-light, and the white rose fastened at her breast.
She looked like a queen. I said "Good-evening," and turned away quickly to
the glass to arrange my old black scarf across my old black dress.
Then I felt a hand touch my hair.
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