| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Moby Dick by Herman Melville: dancing over. I'll dance over your grave, I will--that's the
bitterest threat of your night-women, that beat head-winds round
corners. O Christ! to think of the green navies and the
green-skulled crews! Well, well; belike the whole world's a ball, as
you scholars have it; and so 'tis right to make one ballroom of it.
Dance on, lads, you're young; I was once.
3D NANTUCKET SAILOR.
Spell oh!--whew! this is worse than pulling after whales in a
calm--give us a whiff, Tash.
(THEY CEASE DANCING, AND GATHER IN CLUSTERS. MEANTIME THE SKY
DARKENS--THE WIND RISES.)
Moby Dick |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: I rushed towards the window, and drawing a pistol from my bosom,
fired; but he eluded me, leaped from his station, and running with
the swiftness of lightning, plunged into the lake.
The report of the pistol brought a crowd into the room. I pointed
to the spot where he had disappeared, and we followed the track
with boats; nets were cast, but in vain. After passing several hours,
we returned hopeless, most of my companions believing it to have been
a form conjured up by my fancy. After having landed, they proceeded
to search the country, parties going in different directions among
the woods and vines.
I attempted to accompany them and proceeded a short distance from
Frankenstein |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Long Odds by H. Rider Haggard: somewhere; the delicate question was, where. I peeped and poked and
looked in every possible direction, with my heart in my mouth, and was
at last rewarded by catching a glimpse of something yellow moving behind
a bush. At the same moment, from another bush opposite me out burst one
of the cubs and galloped back towards the burnt pan. I whipped round
and let drive a snap shot that tipped him head over heels, breaking his
back within two inches of the root of the tail, and there he lay
helpless but glaring. Tom afterwards killed him with his assegai. I
opened the breech of the gun and hurriedly pulled out the old case,
which, to judge from what ensued, must, I suppose, have burst and left a
portion of its fabric sticking to the barrel. At any rate, when I tried
Long Odds |
