Today's Stichomancy for David Bowie

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mountains by Stewart Edward White:

By now it was dark, and a bitter cold swooped down from the mountains. We built a fire in a huge stone fireplace and sat around in the flickering light telling ghost-stories to one another. The place was rudely furnished, with only a hard earthen floor, and chairs hewn by the axe. Rifles, spurs, bits, revolvers, branding-irons in turn caught the light and vanished in the shadow. The skin of a bear looked at us from hollow eye-sockets in which there were no eyes. We talked of the Long Trail. Outside the wind, rising, howled through the shakes of the roof

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson:

letter; and I am at a loss whether I should show it to the police. I should like to leave it in your hands, Utterson; you would judge wisely, I am sure; I have so great a trust in you."

"You fear, I suppose, that it might lead to his detection?" asked the lawyer.

"No," said the other. "I cannot say that I care what becomes of Hyde; I am quite done with him. I was thinking of my own character, which this hateful business has rather exposed."

Utterson ruminated awhile; he was surprised at his friend's selfishness, and yet relieved by it. "Well," said he, at last, "let me see the letter."

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan:

traduced behind their Backs[;] and when ugly circumstances come out against our acquaintances I own I always love to think the best--by the bye I hope 'tis not true that your Brother is absolutely ruin'd--

SURFACE. I am afraid his circumstances are very bad indeed, Ma'am--

MRS. CANDOUR. Ah! I heard so--but you must tell him to keep up his Spirits--everybody almost is in the same way--Lord Spindle, Sir Thomas Splint, Captain Quinze, and Mr. Nickit--all up, I hear, within this week; so, if Charles is undone, He'll find half his Acquaintance ruin'd too, and that, you know, is a consolation--

SURFACE. Doubtless, Ma'am--a very great one.

Enter SERVANT

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 The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad:

enough for that. He filled the whole field of vision for me."

"You found that enough?" asked Mills.

"Why ask now?" she remonstrated. "The truth - the truth is that I never asked myself. Enough or not there was no room for anything else. He was the shadow and the light and the form and the voice. He would have it so. The morning he died they came to call me at four o'clock. I ran into his room bare-footed. He recognized me and whispered, 'You are flawless.' I was very frightened. He seemed to think, and then said very plainly, 'Such is my character. I am like that.' These were the last words he spoke. I hardly noticed them then. I was thinking that he was lying in a very

The Arrow of Gold