| 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: a great many things I had lately discovered. Mrs. Harling
came to the Opera House to hear the Commencement exercises,
and I looked at her most of the time while I made my speech.
Her keen, intelligent eyes never left my face.
Afterward she came back to the dressing-room where we stood,
with our diplomas in our hands, walked up to me, and said heartily:
`You surprised me, Jim. I didn't believe you could do as
well as that. You didn't get that speech out of books.'
Among my graduation presents there was a silk umbrella from
Mrs. Harling, with my name on the handle.
I walked home from the Opera House alone. As I passed
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: savagely at a bit of water-soaked board that lay in my way.
"Very handsome - as large as you are, but fair, and even more erect."
I drew my shoulders up sharply. I am straight enough, but I was
fairly sagging with jealous rage.
"When mother began to get around, somebody told her that I had been
going about with Mrs. Curtis and her brother, and we had a dreadful
time. I was dragged home like a bad child. Did anybody ever do
that to you?"
"Nobody ever cared. I was born an orphan," I said, with a cheerless
attempt at levity. "Go on."
"If Mrs. Curtis knew, she never said anything. She wrote me charming
The Man in Lower Ten |
