| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: and my statement of application."
"Very well. Nevertheless we cannot let you depart so soon. The
indentures shall be completed to-day, but you must continue your
sojourn in our midst. I will issue the necessary orders at once."
So saying, he opened the door into the general office, where the
clerks looked like a swarm of bees around a honeycomb (if I may liken
affairs of Government to such an article?).
"Is Ivan Antonovitch here?" asked the President.
"Yes," replied a voice from within.
"Then send him here."
Upon that the pitcher-faced Ivan Antonovitch made his appearance in
Dead Souls |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Adam Bede by George Eliot: would leave all the present evils just as they were and add worse
evils to them. You may tell me that you meditate no fatal act of
vengeance, but the feeling in your mind is what gives birth to
such actions, and as long as you indulge it, as long as you do not
see that to fix your mind on Arthur's punishment is revenge, and
not justice, you are in danger of being led on to the commission
of some great wrong. Remember what you told me about your
feelings after you had given that blow to Arthur in the Grove."
Adam was silent: the last words had called up a vivid image of the
past, and Mr. Irwine left him to his thoughts, while he spoke to
Bartle Massey about old Mr. Donnithorne's funeral and other
Adam Bede |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Arrow of Gold by Joseph Conrad: from Dona Rita saying that she had gone into retreat and that she
did not mean to send him her address, not being in the humour to be
worried with letters on any subject whatever. "It's enough for
you" - she wrote - "to know that I am alive." Later, at irregular
intervals, he received scraps of paper bearing the stamps of
various post offices and containing the simple statement: "I am
still alive," signed with an enormous, flourished exuberant R. I
imagine Rose had to travel some distances by rail to post those
messages. A thick veil of secrecy had been lowered between the
world and the lovers; yet even this veil turned out not altogether
impenetrable.
The Arrow of Gold |
