| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy: me so well. Would you like to undertake it? You might read to
me, too, if desirable. Will you think it over, and ask your
parents if they are willing?"
"Oh yes," said Grace. "I am almost sure they would be very glad."
"You are so accomplished, I hear; I should be quite honored by
such intellectual company."
Grace, modestly blushing, deprecated any such idea.
"Do you keep up your lucubrations at Little Hintock?"
"Oh no. Lucubrations are not unknown at Little Hintock; but they
are not carried on by me."
"What--another student in that retreat?"
The Woodlanders |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Fanny Herself by Edna Ferber: The mid-October country was a lovely thing. Fanny, with the
strain of Theodore's debut and leave-taking behind her, and
the prospect of a high-tension business talk with Fenger
ahead, drank in the beauty of the wayside woods gratefully.
Fenger met her at the station. She had never seen him so
boyish, so exuberant. He almost pranced.
"Hop in," he said. He had driven down in a runabout.
"Brother get off all right? Gad! He CAN play. And
you've made the whole thing possible." He turned to look at
her. "You're a wonder."
"In your present frame of mind and state of being," laughed
Fanny Herself |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau by Honore de Balzac: that honor might be restored to the merchant who had never really lost
it,--a solitary instance of such an appeal; for a condemned man can
only be pardoned. Men of honor alone can imagine the emotions of Cesar
Birotteau as he heard Monsieur de Grandville pronounce a speech, of
which the following is an abridgement:--
"Gentlemen," said that celebrated official, "on the 16th of
January, 1820, Birotteau was declared a bankrupt by the commercial
tribunal of the Seine. His failure was not caused by imprudence,
nor by rash speculations, nor by any act that stained his honor.
We desire to say publicly that this failure was the result of a
disaster which has again and again occurred, to the detriment of
Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau |
