| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: marriage ready for his foot, which his mother had obtained for him in
the person of Mademoiselle d'Annebaut, who was a graceful maiden of
good appearance, and well furnished with everything, having a splendid
hotel in the Rue Barbette, with handsome furniture and Italian
paintings and many considerable lands to inherit. Some days after the
death of King Francis--a circumstance which planted terror in the
heart of everyone, because his said Majesty had died in consequence of
an attack of the Neapolitan sickness, and that for the future there
would be no security even with princesses of the highest birth--the
above-named Maille was compelled to quit the Court in order to go and
arrange certain affairs of great importance in Piedmont. You may be
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield: stool. When she saw Miss Meadows she gave a loud, warning "Sh-sh! girls!"
and Miss Meadows, her hands thrust in her sleeves, the baton under her arm,
strode down the centre aisle, mounted the steps, turned sharply, seized the
brass music stand, planted it in front of her, and gave two sharp taps with
her baton for silence.
"Silence, please! Immediately!" and, looking at nobody, her glance swept
over that sea of coloured flannel blouses, with bobbing pink faces and
hands, quivering butterfly hair-bows, and music-books outspread. She knew
perfectly well what they were thinking. "Meady is in a wax." Well, let
them think it! Her eyelids quivered; she tossed her head, defying them.
What could the thoughts of those creatures matter to some one who stood
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: of the most intimate and lasting relationships of her life.
The Country of the Pointed Firs (1896) is considered
Jewett's finest work, described by Henry James as her "beautiful
little quantum of achievement." Despite James's diminutives, the
novel remains a classic. Because it is loosely structured, many
critics view the book not as a novel, but a series of sketches;
however, its structure is unified through both setting and theme.
Jewett herself felt that her strengths as a writer lay not in plot
development or dramatic tension, but in character development.
Indeed, she determined early in her career to preserve a
disappearing way of life, and her novel can be read as a study of
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