| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Lone Star Ranger by Zane Grey: the hum of voices, all seemed far off. His life hung by the
merest thread. Yet he did not think of that so much as of the
brand of a woman-murderer which might be soon sealed upon him
by a frightened, imaginative child.
The crowd trooped apart and closed again. Duane caught a
blurred image of a slight girl clinging to Sibert's hand. He
could not see distinctly. Aiken lifted the child, whispered
soothingly to her not to be afraid. Then he fetched her closer
to Duane.
"Lucy, tell me. Did you ever see this man before?" asked Aiken,
huskily and low. "Is he the one--who came in the house that
The Lone Star Ranger |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson: transformation had not done tearing him, before Henry Jekyll,
with streaming tears of gratitude and remorse, had fallen upon
his knees and lifted his clasped hands to God. The veil of
self-indulgence was rent from head to foot. I saw my life as a
whole: I followed it up from the days of childhood, when I had
walked with my father's hand, and through the self-denying toils
of my professional life, to arrive again and again, with the same
sense of unreality, at the damned horrors of the evening. I
could have screamed aloud; I sought with tears and prayers to
smother down the crowd of hideous images and sounds with which my
memory swarmed against me; and still, between the petitions, the
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Light of Western Stars by Zane Grey: the last one in the room she used as an office a clattering roar
of hoofs seemed to swell up to the front of the house. She
caught a glimpse of wild, shaggy horses and ragged, dusty men.
She had never seen any vaqueros that resembled these horsemen.
Vaqueros had grace and style; they were fond of lace and glitter
and fringe; they dressed their horses in silvered trappings. But
the riders now trampling into the driveway were uncouth. lean,
savage. They were guerrillas, a band of the raiders who had been
harassing the border since the beginning of the revolution. A
second glimpse assured Madeline that they were not all Mexicans.
The presence of outlaws in that band brought home to Madeline her
The Light of Western Stars |
