| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: nautical difficulties in such a view which made me express the
sanguine opinion that she was in all innocence simply changing her
station. At this Dominic condescended to turn his head.
"I tell you she is in chase," he affirmed moodily, after one short
glance astern.
I never doubted his opinion. But with all the ardour of a neophyte
and the pride of an apt learner I was at that time a great nautical
casuist.
"What I can't understand," I insisted subtly, "is how on earth,
with this wind, she has managed to be just where she was when we
first made her out. It is clear that she could not, and did not,
The Mirror of the Sea |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from American Notes by Rudyard Kipling: strewn with moss agates, and everybody had to jump out and pant
in that thin air. But how intoxicating it was! The old lady from
Chicago ducked like an emancipated hen as she scuttled about the
road, cramming pieces of rock into her reticule. She sent me
fifty yards down to the hill-side to pick up a piece of broken
bottle which she insisted was moss agate.
"I've some o' that at home, an' they shine. Yes, you go get it,
young man."
As we climbed the long path the road grew viler and viler till it
became, without disguise, the bed of a torrent; and just when
things were at their rockiest we nearly fell into a little
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Youth by Joseph Conrad: heard after he got on deck were mere trifles in com-
parison. And, mark, he noticed directly the wheel de-
serted and his bark off her course--and his only
thought was to get that miserable, stripped, undecked,
smoldering shell of a ship back again with her head
pointing at her port of destination. Bankok! That's
what he was after. I tell you this quiet, bowed, bandy-
legged, almost deformed little man was immense in the
singleness of his idea and in his placid ignorance of
our agitation. He motioned us forward with a com-
manding gesture, and went to take the wheel him-
Youth |
