| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from McTeague by Frank Norris: herself off. McTeague returned to the sofa and flung
himself upon it face downward.
A little before supper time Maria completed her search. The
flat was cleaned of its junk from top to bottom. The dirty
pillow-case was full to bursting. She took advantage of the
supper hour to carry her bundle around the corner and up
into the alley where Zerkow lived.
When Maria entered his shop, Zerkow had just come in from
his daily rounds. His decrepit wagon stood in front of his
door like a stranded wreck; the miserable horse, with its
lamentable swollen joints, fed greedily upon an armful of
McTeague |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Walking by Henry David Thoreau: the figures of serpents, griffins, flying dragons, and other
fanciful embellishments of heraldry, have their prototypes in the
forms of fossil species which were extinct before man was
created, and hence "indicate a faint and shadowy knowledge of a
previous state of organic existence." The Hindus dreamed that the
earth rested on an elephant, and the elephant on a tortoise, and
the tortoise on a serpent; and though it may be an unimportant
coincidence, it will not be out of place here to state, that a
fossil tortoise has lately been discovered in Asia large enough
to support an elephant. I confess that I am partial to these wild
fancies, which transcend the order of time and development. They
Walking |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Letters from England by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft: Byron has selected it as her residence, though her estates are in
Leicestershire, because it is near Lord and Lady Lovelace, her only
child, the "ADA" of poetry. We went in our own carriage, taking
Miss Murray with us, and as the country is now radiant with blossoms
and glowing green, the drive itself was very agreeable. We arrived
at two o'clock, and found only Lady Byron, with the second boy of
Lady Lovelace and his tutor. Lady Byron is now about fifty-five,
and with the remains of an attractive, if not brilliant beauty. She
has extremely delicate features, and very pale and finely delicate
skin. A tone of voice and manner of the most trembling refinement,
with a culture and strong intellect, almost masculine, but which
|
