| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: scamp'd swap his skin any time for a drink of running water. I guess
I'll find him there, all right."
A few minutes later Alvarita stopped upon the forward platform, ready
for her quest. Her handsome black skirt was shaped to the most recent
proclamation of fashion. Her spotless shirt-waist gladdened the eye in
that desert of sunshine, a swelling oasis, cool and fresh. A man's
split-straw hat sat firmly on her coiled, abundant hair. Beneath her
serene, round, impudent chin a man's four-in-hand tie was jauntily
knotted about a man's high, stiff collar. A parasol she carried, of
white silk, and its fringe was lace, yellowly genuine.
I will grant Gallipolis as to her costume, but firmly to Seville or
Heart of the West |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Confidence by Henry James: The little terrace had an old polished parapet, about as high
as a man's breast, above which was a view of strange,
sad-colored hills. Outside, to the left, the wall of the town made
an outward bend, and exposed its rugged and rusty complexion.
There was a smooth stone bench set into the wall of the church,
on which Longueville had rested for an hour, observing the
composition of the little picture of which I have indicated
the elements, and of which the parapet of the terrace would form
the foreground. The thing was what painters call a subject,
and he had promised himself to come back with his utensils.
This morning he returned to the inn and took possession of them,
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne: Neb was devotion personified. Clever, intelligent, indefatigable, robust,
with iron health, he knew a little about the work of the forge, and could
not fail to be very useful in the colony.
As to Pencroft, he had sailed over every sea, a carpenter in the
dockyards in Brooklyn, assistant tailor in the vessels of the state,
gardener, cultivator, during his holidays, etc., and like all seamen, fit
for anything, he knew how to do everything.
It would have been difficult to unite five men, better fitted to struggle
against fate, more certain to triumph over it.
"At the beginning," Cyrus Harding had said. Now this beginning of which
the engineer spoke was the construction of an apparatus which would serve
The Mysterious Island |
