| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Tales of Unrest by Joseph Conrad: on a sudden impulse only three days after I wrote the last line of
"The Nigger," and the recollection of its difficulties is mixed up
with the worries of the unfinished "Return," the last pages of which I
took up again at the time; the only instance in my life when I made an
attempt to write with both hands at once as it were.
Indeed my innermost feeling, now, is that "The Return" is a left-
handed production. Looking through that story lately I had the
material impression of sitting under a large and expensive umbrella in
the loud drumming of a heavy rain-shower. It was very distracting. In
the general uproar one could hear every individual drop strike on the
stout and distended silk. Mentally, the reading rendered me dumb for
Tales of Unrest |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The King of the Golden River by John Ruskin: It was the most extraordinary-looking little gentleman he had
ever seen in his life. He had a very large nose, slightly brass-
colored; his cheeks were very round and very red, and might have
warranted a supposition that he had been blowing a refractory fire
for the last eight-and-forty hours; his eyes twinkled merrily
through long, silky eyelashes; his mustaches curled twice round like
a corkscrew on each side of his mouth; and his hair, of a curious
mixed pepper-and-salt color, descended far over his shoulders. He
was about four feet six in height and wore a conical pointed cap of
nearly the same altitude, decorated with a black feather some three
feet long. His doublet was prolonged behind into something
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: chair; "since when is it the fashion to laugh at uncles who have
twenty-six thousand francs a year from solid acres to which we are the
sole heir? Let me tell you that in the olden time we stood in awe of
such uncles as that. Come, speak up, what fault have you to find with
me? Haven't I played my part as uncle properly? Did I ever require you
to respect me? Have I ever refused you money? When did I shut the door
in your face on pretence that you had come to look after my health?
Haven't you had the most accommodating and the least domineering uncle
that there is in France,--I won't say Europe, because that might be
too presumptuous. You write to me, or you don't write,--no matter, I
live on pledged affection, and I am making you the prettiest estate in
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