| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from To-morrow by Joseph Conrad: told me--this very morning. . . . Eh? what?"
He bent his ear; she whispered rapidly, and he
listened for a while, muttering the words "yes"
and "I see" at times. Then, "But why won't to-
day do?" he queried at last.
"You didn't understand me!" she exclaimed,
impatiently. The clear streak of light under the
clouds died out in the west. Again he stooped
slightly to hear better; and the deep night buried
everything of the whispering woman and the
attentive man, except the familiar contiguity of
To-morrow |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Drama on the Seashore by Honore de Balzac: "How beautiful this silence!" she said to me; "and how the depth of it
is deepened by the rhythmic quiver of the wave upon the shore."
"If you will give your understanding to the three immensities which
surround us, the water, the air, and the sands, and listen exclusively
to the repeating sounds of flux and reflux," I answered her, "you will
not be able to endure their speech; you will think it is uttering a
thought which will annihilate you. Last evening, at sunset, I had that
sensation; and it exhausted me."
"Oh! let us talk, let us talk," she said, after a long pause. "I
understand it. No orator was ever more terrible. I think," she
continued, presently, "that I perceive the causes of the harmonies
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from O Pioneers! by Willa Cather:
"Milly needn't be afraid of Ivar. She's an
especial favorite of his. In my opinion Ivar has
just as much right to his own way of dressing
and thinking as we have. But I'll see that he
doesn't bother other people. I'll keep him at
home, so don't trouble any more about him,
Lou. I've been wanting to ask you about your
new bathtub. How does it work?"
Annie came to the fore to give Lou time to
O Pioneers! |
