On my fourth re-read of this book, I still feel strongly that the third story (reflecting the element of Earth) is the most compelling. In fact, three times in the past I've checked out this book from the library only to re-read the 3rd story in order to give myself strength. There are four stories total, each dominated by an elemental: earth, air, fire, water. The ending story is the second best IMHO; although tragic, it is ultimately hopeful that at the end, perhaps we are not doomed. Here are my favorite quotes, beginning with the 3rd story: "The stone sat on its hillside and thought. Its thoughts were not cerebral. It had no cerebral cortex. Nor were they visceral. Stones do not need viscera. The thoughts of the stone are the thoughts of earth, compacted, weighed down by the eons, thrust upward by cataclysm, encased in ice. Immobile for millenia. Then pushed, shoved, draggged, dropped . . . "Two-legged mammals arrived. They recognized the stone as fearsome and holy and bowed in worship before it. In what served as its consciousness, the stone thought this behavior just and proper. It was part of the sacred earth."My favorite section is when Annie becomes one with the rock/earth: "You are thinking the earth's thoughts.There was no love, no hate. The entity was incapable of either, as neither was required for its survival. Likewise, it had no understanding of birth and death as humans understood those things. But it did have a sense of justice. In the vast planetary scale all things must be kept in balance.The entity was aware of construction and destruction. Of exhaustion and replenishment. Of give and take.It took. It gave accordingly, in kind, as it perceived with its nonhuman intellect. What it gave might be accepted by humans as a gift or a curse, a bounty or a famine. But on the earth's scale, it was always a matter of maintaining the balance.The earth did not care how humans were affected. They were specks on its surface, apparently unable to make a lasting impressionOr could they?" And the beginning of the chapter on Air:"Everything that is, is alive.Life did not come into this world. The life forms of the earth are a natural product of the earth, as the living planet is a natural product of the living universe. Life in any form is part of life in every form. One, indivisible. The terrestrial spark is connected to the most distant star, just as the collective consciousness of the earth is one cell in the infinitely greater creative intelligence of the universe.It is said no one can know the mind of God.Yet we are the mind of God.And so we dance for joy. We dance to the music of life, which ripples and shimmers across the universe. Even in the coldest depths of space, something is dancing the dance. Something is part of the music.Every molecule of air on earth has its part to play in the whole. Myriad life forms dance in what appears, to human eyes, to be empty air.Air is not empty.Air is alive. The angels of the air sing the songs of the spheres."
This is a book that everyone should read. It has a valuable message but it is not preachy....definitely in the story telling vain that a bard or the keeper of a peoples history would tell. It's a story of mother earth reflected in her elements: water, fire, earth and air. The story about 'air' hits very close to home....meaning it has some warnings that we should take heart and react to, now.It's the book that I often recommend to my friends, usually by gifting it. Go out and read this book....and then respect our planet!ps...I made the mistake of lending my copy which was never returned to me. It's not always easy to find; I know I need to replace my lost copy. Hence the reason why I gift it rather than lend it.
What do You think about The Elementals (2003)?
I enjoyed rereading this book, but it didn't impress me as much at age 31 as it did when I was 20. I like the premise and the 4 different plots are pretty inventive and interesting, but I found the environmental message of the book to be kind of heavy-handed, in a hit-you-over-the-head kind of way. Also, not to split eco-spiritual hairs, but it seems like the message is "You should honor Nature, because it can KILL you." Um, yes, but maybe you should also honor Nature out of something more than pure self-interest?
—Meg
