| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from My Antonia by Willa Cather: He was very hospitable and jolly. Once, while he was looking
at Antonia, he sighed and told us that if he had stayed
at home in Russia perhaps by this time he would have had
a pretty daughter of his own to cook and keep house for him.
He said he had left his country because of a `great trouble.'
When we got up to go, Peter looked about in perplexity for
something that would entertain us. He ran into the storeroom
and brought out a gaudily painted harmonica, sat down on a bench,
and spreading his fat legs apart began to play like a whole band.
The tunes were either very lively or very doleful, and he sang
words to some of them.
My Antonia |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Tik-Tok of Oz by L. Frank Baum: the Hungry Tiger, which were filled with soft
cushions for them to lie upon and golden troughs
for them to eat from.
Beside the stall of the Sawhorse had been placed
another for Hank, the mule. This was not quite so
beautiful as the other, for the Sawhorse was
Ozma's favorite steed; but Hank had a supply of
cushions for a bed (which the Sawhorse did not
need because he never slept) and all this luxury
was so strange to the little mule that he could
only stand still and regard his surroundings and
Tik-Tok of Oz |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: a sorrow which all have felt, and must feel? The time at length
arrives when grief is rather an indulgence than a necessity; and
the smile that plays upon the lips, although it may be deemed a
sacrilege, is not banished. My mother was dead, but we had still
duties which we ought to perform; we must continue our course with
the rest and learn to think ourselves fortunate whilst one remains
whom the spoiler has not seized.
My departure for Ingolstadt, which had been deferred by these events,
was now again determined upon. I obtained from my father a respite
of some weeks. It appeared to me sacrilege so soon to leave the repose,
akin to death, of the house of mourning and to rush into the thick of life.
Frankenstein |
