| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: certainly there was the added ingredient of broken glass, the
man who stole the window-frames having apparently made a
miscarriage with this one. Without a broom, without hay or
bedding, we could but look about us with a beginning of
despair. The one bright arrow of day, in that gaunt and
shattered barrack, made the rest look dirtier and darker, and
the sight drove us at last into the open.
Here, also, the handiwork of man lay ruined: but the plants
were all alive and thriving; the view below was fresh with
the colours of nature; and we had exchanged a dim, human
garret for a corner, even although it were untidy, of the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Louis Lambert by Honore de Balzac: idlest, the most dreamy of all the division of "little boys," and
consequently the most frequently punished.
This autobiographical digression may give some idea of the reflections
I was led to make in anticipation of Lambert's arrival. I was then
twelve years old. I felt sympathy from the first for the boy whose
temperament had some points of likeness to my own. I was at last to
have a companion in daydreams and meditations. Though I knew not yet
what glory meant, I thought it glory to be the familiar friend of a
child whose immortality was foreseen by Madame de Stael. To me Louis
Lambert was as a giant.
The looked-for morrow came at last. A minute before breakfast we heard
Louis Lambert |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Symposium by Xenophon: that's all. Any other savagery on your part I can stand, and will
stand, as a lover should. However (he added), the less we say about
your love the better, since it is clearly an attachment not to my
soul, but to my lovely person.
[16] Or, "tear and scratch me."
And then, turning to Callias: And that you, Callias, do love
Autolycus, this whole city knows and half the world besides,[17] if I
am not mistaken; and the reason is that you are both sons of famous
fathers, and yourselves illustrious. For my part I have ever admired
your nature, but now much more so, when I see that you are in love
with one who does not wanton in luxury or languish in effeminacy,[18]
The Symposium |
