| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce: him! The cannon had taken an hand in the game. As he shook
his head free from the commotion of the smitten water he
heard the deflected shot humming through the air ahead, and
in an instant it was cracking and smashing the branches in
the forest beyond.
"They will not do that again," he thought; "the next time
they will use a charge of grape. I must keep my eye upon
the gun; the smoke will apprise me -- the report arrives too
late; it lags behind the missile. That is a good gun."
Suddenly he felt himself whirled round and round -- spinning
like a top. The water, the banks, the forests, the now
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde: He invented a facile excuse, and having taken the vacant seat
next to her, looked round to see who was there. Dorian bowed
to him shyly from the end of the table, a flush of pleasure
stealing into his cheek. Opposite was the Duchess of Harley,
a lady of admirable good-nature and good temper, much liked
by every one who knew her, and of those ample architectural
proportions that in women who are not duchesses are described
by contemporary historians as stoutness. Next to her sat,
on her right, Sir Thomas Burdon, a Radical member of Parliament,
who followed his leader in public life and in private life
followed the best cooks, dining with the Tories and thinking
The Picture of Dorian Gray |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic: in a comprehensive, stately gesture. The audience rose at him,
as he dropped his hand, and filled his day-dream with a
mighty roar of applause, in volume like an ocean tempest,
yet pitched for his hearing alone.
He smiled, shook himself with a little delighted tremor,
and turned on the stoop to the open door.
"What Soulsby said about politics out there interested
me enormously," he remarked to the two women. "I shouldn't
be surprised if I found myself doing something in that line.
I can speak, you know, if I can't do anything else.
Talk is what tells, these days. Who knows? I may turn
The Damnation of Theron Ware |
