| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: lawless, and practically letterless until he had drifted into the
night classes of the Albert League, where Ghillini sometimes
lectured. From the moment he came under the eye and influence of
that erratic Italian, then a political exile, his life had swerved
sharply from its old channel. This man had been at once incentive
and guide, friend and master, to his pupil. He had taken the raw
clay out of the London streets and molded it anew. Seemingly he
had divined at once where the boy's possibilities lay, and had
thrown aside every canon of orthodox instruction in the training of
him. Under him Treffinger acquired his superficial, yet facile,
knowledge of the classics; had steeped himself in the monkish Latin
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost: the full luxury of my situation; and being restrained, by a sense
of honour, as well as a lurking apprehension of the police, from
renewing my intimacy with my former companions at the hotel of
Transylvania, I began to play in certain coteries less notorious,
where my good luck rendered it unnecessary for me to have
recourse to my former accomplishments. I passed a part of the
afternoon in town, and returned always to supper at Chaillot,
accompanied very often by M. de T----, whose intimacy and
friendship for us daily increased.
"Manon soon found resources against ennui. She became
acquainted with some young ladies, whom the spring brought into
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Odyssey by Homer: random into his narrative, has made his whole plot turn on
the injury to the Cyclops. Had he not foolishly exposed
himself and his companions, by his visit to the Cyclops,
Odysseus would never have been driven wandering for ten
weary years. The prayers of the blinded Cyclops were heard
and fulfilled by Poseidon.
From the land of the Cyclops, Odysseus and his company
sailed to the Isle of Aeolus, the king of the winds. This
place too is undefined; we only learn that, even with the
most favourable gale, it was ten days' sail from Ithaca. In
the Isle of Aeolus Odysseus abode for a month, and then
The Odyssey |
