| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Oedipus Trilogy by Sophocles: O listen, since thy presence comes to me
A shock of glad surprise--so noble thou,
And I so vile--O grant me one small boon.
I ask it not on my behalf, but thine.
CREON
And what the favor thou wouldst crave of me?
OEDIPUS
Forth from thy borders thrust me with all speed;
Set me within some vasty desert where
No mortal voice shall greet me any more.
CREON
Oedipus Trilogy |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from What is Man? by Mark Twain: the breath and the warm blood into the book he writes. Rightly
viewed, calf-butchering accounts for "Titus Andronicus," the only
play--ain't it?--that the Stratford Shakespeare ever wrote; and
yet it is the only one everybody tried to chouse him out of, the
Baconians included.
The historians find themselves "justified in believing" that
the young Shakespeare poached upon Sir Thomas Lucy's deer preserves
and got haled before that magistrate for it. But there is no shred
of respectworthy evidence that anything of the kind happened.
The historians, having argued the thing that MIGHT have
happened into the thing that DID happen, found no trouble in
What is Man? |
