| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: papers on her husband's desk lay precisely as they had lain when
she had gone in to call him to luncheon.
Then of a sudden she was seized by a vague dread of the unknown.
She had closed the door behind her on entering, and as she stood
alone in the long, silent, shadowy room, her dread seemed to take
shape and sound, to be there audibly breathing and lurking among
the shadows. Her short-sighted eyes strained through them, half-
discerning an actual presence, something aloof, that watched and
knew; and in the recoil from that intangible propinquity she
threw herself suddenly on the bell-rope and gave it a desperate
pull.
|
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg by Mark Twain: with a burning interest, a mouth-watering interest, a wistful and
pathetic interest; a minority of nineteen couples gazed at it
tenderly, lovingly, proprietarily, and the male half of this
minority kept saying over to themselves the moving little impromptu
speeches of thankfulness for the audience's applause and
congratulations which they were presently going to get up and
deliver. Every now and then one of these got a piece of paper out
of his vest pocket and privately glanced at it to refresh his
memory.
Of course there was a buzz of conversation going on--there always
is; but at last, when the Rev. Mr. Burgess rose and laid his hand on
The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Oakdale Affair by Edgar Rice Burroughs: den halt. There was only the road to the right, then,
after all. Cautiously he moved toward it, and at the
same time the words of the voice came clearly through
the night:
"'. . . as, swinging heel and toe,
'We tramped the road to Anywhere, the magic road
to Anywhere,
'The tragic road to Anywhere, such dear, dim years
ago.'"
The voice seemed reassuring--its quality and the an-
nunciation of the words bespoke for its owner consider-
The Oakdale Affair |
