Extracts from Literature
Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘Extracts from Literature’
Anne Elliot resents being expected to court the society of anyone simply because of social status.
Anne Elliot’s snobbish father Sir Walter, of Camden Place in Bath, usually wastes no time on those who fall short of his exacting standards in beauty or manners. But as Anne complains to her attentive cousin, Mr Elliot, he makes a grovelling exception for his aristocratic relations, the Dalrymples.
Muddle-headed inventor Professor Cavor needs to think aloud, and for reasons of his own Mr Bedford is anxious to listen.
Mr Bedford has complained about Professor Cavor’s habit of humming loudly as he passes by, thinking scientific thoughts, on his regular afternoon walk. As a result, the Professor’s walks have lost their magic, and Bedford feels guilty.
The Cross of Christ speaks, and tells of the amazing transformation from sign of shame to sign of redemption.
‘The Dream of the Rood’ is an Anglo-Saxon poem, possibly composed by the 8th century bishop Cynewulf of Lindisfarne, in the Kingdom of Northumbria. The poet imagines what the Cross of Christ might say of that momentous Friday, when he who hung the earth upon the waters hung upon the cross.
Rudyard Kipling’s much-loved verses are a reflection on what it is that builds real character.
First published in Rewards and Fairies (1910), the verses below followed a story about George Washington’s principles of leadership, though Kipling tells us that the initial inspiration for the poem had been his friend Storr Jameson, Prime Minister of the Cape Colony in 1904-8. ‘If...’ quickly became, as it has remained ever since, one of the nation’s favourites.
Kipling borrowed from the Greek Independence movement to give thanks for the end of the Great War.
Kipling’s poem, published at the end of the Great War in the ‘Daily Telegraph’ on October 17, 1918, is a verse-paraphrase of the Greek National Anthem. The original was composed by Dionýsios Solomós in 1823, and ran to 158 verses.