| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Chance by Joseph Conrad: scuttle hatch was closed and padlocked. Powell was gone. He had
walked off into that dark, still marsh somewhere. I had not seen a
single house anywhere near; there did not seem to be any human
habitation for miles; and now as darkness fell denser over the land
I couldn't see the glimmer of a single light. However, I supposed
that there must be some village or hamlet not very far away; or only
one of these mysterious little inns one comes upon sometimes in most
unexpected and lonely places.
"The stillness was oppressive. I went back to my boat, made some
coffee over a spirit-lamp, devoured a few biscuits, and stretched
myself aft, to smoke and gaze at the stars. The earth was a mere
Chance |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Son of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: beast, now thoroughly aroused to bestial rage, and with the
smell of new spilled blood fresh in its nostrils. For an instant he
hesitated, and then again there rose before him the dreams of
affluence which this great anthropoid would doubtless turn to
realities once Paulvitch had landed him safely in some great
metropolis like London.
The captain was shouting to him now to stand aside that he
might have a shot at the animal; but instead Paulvitch shuffled
to the ape's side, and though the man's hair quivered at its roots
he mastered his fear and laid hold of the ape's arm.
"Come!" he commanded, and tugged to pull the beast from
The Son of Tarzan |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Last War: A World Set Free by H. G. Wells: not till the Thursday that the dead came to the surface in any
quantity. The view was bounded on every side by a gray mist that
closed overhead in a gray canopy. The air cleared in the
afternoon, and then, far away to the west under great banks of
steam and dust, the flaming red eruption of the atomic bombs came
visible across the waste of water.
They showed flat and sullen through the mist, like London
sunsets. 'They sat upon the sea,' says Barnet, 'like frayed-out
waterlilies of flame.'
Barnet seems to have spent the morning in rescue work along the
track of the canal, in helping people who were adrift, in picking
The Last War: A World Set Free |
