| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: upon a scene of weird witchcraft; the strange captain having
a quiet confabulation by the wheel with his own gray ghost.
I became very much concerned to prevent anything of the sort.
I heard the other's soothing undertone.
"My father's a parson in Norfolk," it said. Evidently he had
forgotten he had told me this important fact before.
Truly a nice little tale.
"You had better slip down into my stateroom now," I said,
moving off stealthily. My double followed my movements;
our bare feet made no sound; I let him in, closed the door
with care, and, after giving a call to the second mate,
The Secret Sharer |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Scenes from a Courtesan's Life by Honore de Balzac: of one of those mysteries with three actors which constitute an opera
ball, and are known only to those who play a part in them; for, to
young wives who come merely to say, "I have seen it," to country
people, to inexperienced youths, and to foreigners, the opera house
must on those nights be the palace of fatigue and dulness. To these,
that black swarm, slow and serried--coming, going, winding, turning,
returning, mounting, descending, comparable only to ants on a pile of
wood--is no more intelligible than the Bourse to a Breton peasant who
has never heard of the Grand livre.
With a few rare exceptions, men wear no masks in Paris; a man in a
domino is thought ridiculous. In this the spirit of the nation betrays
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: round his neck, and with his fingers he touched the thin reed of
the throat. Bitter, bitter was his joy, and full of strange
gladness was his pain.
The black sea came nearer, and the white foam moaned like a leper.
With white claws of foam the sea grabbled at the shore. From the
palace of the Sea-King came the cry of mourning again, and far out
upon the sea the great Tritons blew hoarsely upon their horns.
'Flee away,' said his Soul, 'for ever doth the sea come nigher, and
if thou tarriest it will slay thee. Flee away, for I am afraid,
seeing that thy heart is closed against me by reason of the
greatness of thy love. Flee away to a place of safety. Surely
|
