| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Dark Lady of the Sonnets by George Bernard Shaw: and self-portrayal, as in Hamlet and Mercutio, is another. Shakespear
never "saw himself," as actors say, in Romeo or Orsino or Antonio. In
Mr Harris's own play Shakespear is presented with the most pathetic
tenderness. He is tragic, bitter, pitiable, wretched and broken among
a robust crowd of Jonsons and Elizabeths; but to me he is not
Shakespear because I miss the Shakespearian irony and the
Shakespearian gaiety. Take these away and Shakespear is no longer
Shakespear: all the bite, the impetus, the strength, the grim delight
in his own power of looking terrible facts in the face with a chuckle,
is gone; and you have nothing left but that most depressing of all
things: a victim. Now who can think of Shakespear as a man with a
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Two Poets by Honore de Balzac: even greater force in solitude, as he dwelt upon the difficulties in
the way, was timid, and looked for encouragement; for David stood more
in awe of Eve than a simple clerk of some high-born lady. He was
awkward and ill at ease in the presence of his idol, and as eager to
hurry away as he had been to come. He repressed his passion, and was
silent. Often of an evening, on some pretext of consulting Lucien, he
would leave the Place du Murier and go down through the Palet Gate as
far as L'Houmeau, but at the sight of the green iron railings his
heart failed. Perhaps he had come too late, Eve might think him a
nuisance; she would be in bed by this time no doubt; and so he turned
back. But though his great love had only appeared in trifles, Eve read
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Walden by Henry David Thoreau: at first gently nibbled and crumbled off, but at length heaving up
and scattering its wrecks along the island to a considerable height
before it came to a standstill.
At length the sun's rays have attained the right angle, and warm
winds blow up mist and rain and melt the snowbanks, and the sun,
dispersing the mist, smiles on a checkered landscape of russet and
white smoking with incense, through which the traveller picks his
way from islet to islet, cheered by the music of a thousand tinkling
rills and rivulets whose veins are filled with the blood of winter
which they are bearing off.
Few phenomena gave me more delight than to observe the forms
Walden |
