| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte: power of pleasing him? YOU of importance to him in any way? Go!
your folly sickens me. And you have derived pleasure from
occasional tokens of preference--equivocal tokens shown by a
gentleman of family and a man of the world to a dependent and a
novice. How dared you? Poor stupid dupe!--Could not even self-
interest make you wiser? You repeated to yourself this morning the
brief scene of last night?--Cover your face and be ashamed! He said
something in praise of your eyes, did he? Blind puppy! Open their
bleared lids and look on your own accursed senselessness! It does
good to no woman to be flattered by her superior, who cannot
possibly intend to marry her; and it is madness in all women to let
Jane Eyre |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Tales and Fantasies by Robert Louis Stevenson: heather. A shower had just skimmed by, but now the sun shone
brightly, and the air smelt of the pines and the grass. On a
stone under the trees sat a young lady sketching. We have
learned to think of women in a sort of symbolic
transfiguration, based on clothes; and one of the readiest
ways in which we conceive our mistress is as a composite
thing, principally petticoats. But humanity has triumphed
over clothes; the look, the touch of a dress has become
alive; and the woman who stitched herself into these material
integuments has now permeated right through and gone out to
the tip of her skirt. It was only a black dress that caught
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Alexander's Bridge by Willa Cather: met Mr. Alexander and his wife in Tokyo.
Mainhall cut in impatiently.
"I say, Sir Harry, the little girl's
going famously to-night, isn't she?"
Sir Harry wrinkled his brows judiciously.
"Do you know, I thought the dance a bit
conscious to-night, for the first time. The fact
is, she's feeling rather seedy, poor child.
Westmere and I were back after the first act,
and we thought she seemed quite uncertain of
herself. A little attack of nerves, possibly."
Alexander's Bridge |
