| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Familiar Studies of Men and Books by Robert Louis Stevenson: some departure from the traditional canons of romance; but
taking each separately, one would have feared to make too
much of these departures, or to found any theory upon what
was perhaps purely accidental. The appearance of QUATRE
VINGT TREIZE has put us out of the region of such doubt.
Like a doctor who has long been hesitating how to classify an
epidemic malady, we have come at last upon a case so well
marked that our uncertainty is at an end. It is a novel
built upon "a sort of enigma," which was at that date laid
before revolutionary France, and which is presented by Hugo
to Tellmarch, to Lantenac, to Gauvain, and very terribly to
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Professor by Charlotte Bronte: to it she could at any time subject her inclination, if that
inclination went counter to her convictions of right; yet when
called upon to wrestle with the propensities, the habits, the
faults of others, of children especially, who are deaf to reason,
and, for the most part, insensate to persuasion, her will
sometimes almost refused to act; then came in the sense of duty,
and forced the reluctant will into operation. A wasteful expense
of energy and labour was frequently the consequence; Frances
toiled for and with her pupils like a drudge, but it was long ere
her conscientious exertions were rewarded by anything like
docility on their part, because they saw that they had power over
The Professor |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle: day for anyone that he saw with a joyous or a merry look upon his face.
Then he and his Queen and all the court left the place, but the King's
heart was brimming full of wrath.
After the King had gone, all the yeomen of the archer guard came
crowding around Robin, and Little John, and Will, and Allan,
to snatch a look at these famous fellows from the mid-country;
and with them came many that had been onlookers at the sport,
for the same purpose. Thus it happened presently that the yeomen,
to whom Gilbert stood talking, were all surrounded by a crowd
of people that formed a ring about them.
After a while the three judges that had the giving away of the prizes
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood |
