| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Footnote to History by Robert Louis Stevenson: Germans alone, no trace of humour is to be observed, and their
solemnity is accompanied by a touchiness often beyond belief.
Patriotism flies in arms about a hen; and if you comment upon the
colour of a Dutch umbrella, you have cast a stone against the
German Emperor. I give one instance, typical although extreme.
One who had returned from Tutuila on the mail cutter complained of
the vermin with which she is infested. He was suddenly and sharply
brought to a stand. The ship of which he spoke, he was reminded,
was a German ship.
John Caesar Godeffroy himself had never visited the islands; his
sons and nephews came, indeed, but scarcely to reap laurels; and
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: moved against a dressing-room blind above, gave way to another shadow,
an indefinite procession of shadows, who rouged and powdered in an
invisible glass.
"Who is this Gatsby anyhow?" demanded Tom suddenly. "Some big bootlegger?"
"Where'd you hear that?" I inquired.
"I didn't hear it. I imagined it. A lot of these newly rich people are
just big bootleggers, you know."
"Not Gatsby," I said shortly.
He was silent for a moment. The pebbles of the drive crunched under his
feet.
"Well, he certainly must have strained himself to get this menagerie
The Great Gatsby |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Mother by Owen Wister: intentions from Ethel. "She does not manage him in the least," Mrs.
Davenport declared to the other ladies, as Ethel and Richard started for
an afternoon drive together. "She will not know anything more when she
brings him back."
But in this Mrs. Davenport did wrong to Ethel's resources. The young wife
did know something more when she brought her husband back from their
drive through the pleasant country. They returned looking like an engaged
couple, rather than parents whose nursery was already a song of three
little voices.
"He has told her," thought Mrs. Davenport at the first sight of them, as
they entered the drawing-room for an afternoon tea. "She does understand
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