| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Octopus by Frank Norris: occupied by the crew of a freight train that lay on the down
track; while on the up line, near at hand and headed in the same
direction, was a detached locomotive, whose engineer and fireman
recognized him, he was sure, as the buckskin leaped across the
rails.
He had had no time to formulate a plan since that morning, when,
tortured with thirst, he had ventured near the spring at the
headwaters of Broderson Creek, on Quien Sabe, and had all but
fallen into the hands of the posse that had been watching for
that very move. It was useless now to regret that he had tried
to foil pursuit by turning back on his tracks to regain the
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from An Open Letter on Translating by Dr. Martin Luther: try to discover how the German says what the Hebrew "ish
chamudoth" expresses. I discover that the German says this, "You
dear Daniel", "you dear Mary", or "you gracious maiden", "you
lovely maiden", "you gentle girl" and so on. A translator must
have a large vocabulary so he can have more words for when a
particular one just does not fit in the context.
Why should I talk about translating so much? I would need an
entire year were I to point out the reasons and concerns behind my
words. I have learned what an art and job translating is by
experience, so I will not tolerate some papal ass or mule as my
critic, or judge. They have not tried the task. If anyone does
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Call of the Wild by Jack London: as swift as a mill-race, when Hans checked it with the rope and
checked too suddenly. The boat flirted over and snubbed in to the
bank bottom up, while Thornton, flung sheer out of it, was carried
down-stream toward the worst part of the rapids, a stretch of wild
water in which no swimmer could live.
Buck had sprung in on the instant; and at the end of three hundred
yards, amid a mad swirl of water, he overhauled Thornton. When he
felt him grasp his tail, Buck headed for the bank, swimming with
all his splendid strength. But the progress shoreward was slow;
the progress down-stream amazingly rapid. From below came the
fatal roaring where the wild current went wilder and was rent in
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