Quick Excerpts, from a Library of 492 Titles

Generated 2022-07-28 13:26:37

Excerpt #1, from The Invisible Man: A Grotesque Romance, by H. G. Wells

…alternately limp and tightly puffed. His mottled face was apprehensive, and he moved with a sort of reluctant alacrity. He turned the corner of the church, and directed his way to the “Coach and Horses.” Among others old Fletcher remembers seeing him, and indeed the old gentleman was so struck by his peculiar agitation that he inadvertently allowed a quantity of whitewash to run down the brush into the sleeve of his coat while regarding him. This stranger, to the perceptions of the proprietor of the cocoanut shy, appeared to be talking to himself, and Mr. Huxter remarked the same thing. He stopped at the foot of the “Coach and Horses” steps, and, according to Mr. Huxter, appeared to undergo a severe internal struggle before he could induce himself to enter the house. Finally he marched up the steps, and was seen by Mr. Huxter to turn to the left and open the door of the parlour. Mr. Huxter heard voices from within the room and from the bar apprising the man of his error. “That room’s private!” said Hall, and the stranger shut the door clumsily and went into the bar. In the course of a few minutes he reappeared, wiping his lips with the back of his hand with an air of quiet satisfaction that somehow impressed Mr. Huxter as assumed. He stood looking about him for some moments, and then Mr. Huxter saw him walk in an oddly furtive manner…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #2, from The Sea

…stage, do you hear me? NINA. It is the dream of my life, which will never come true. ARKADINA. Who knows? Perhaps it will. But let me present Monsieur Boris Trigorin. NINA. I am delighted to meet you. [Embarrassed] I have read all your books. ARKADINA. [Drawing NINA down beside her] Don’t be afraid of him, dear. He is a simple, good-natured soul, even if he is a celebrity. See, he is embarrassed himself. DORN. Couldn’t the curtain be raised now? It is depressing to have it down. SHAMRAEFF. [Loudly] Jacob, my man! Raise the curtain! NINA. [To TRIGORIN] It was a curious play, wasn’t it? TRIGORIN. Very. I couldn’t understand it at all, but I watched it with the greatest pleasure because you acted with such sincerity, and the setting was beautiful. [A pause] There must be a lot of fish in this lake. NINA. Yes, there are. TRIGORIN. I love fishing. I know of nothing pleasanter than to sit on a lake shore in the evening with one’s eyes on a floating cork. NINA. Why, I should think that for one who has tasted the joys of…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #3, from Gulliver’s Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, by Jonathan Swift

…palace, and put out bills in the usual form, containing an exact description of my person and parts. He hired a large room between three and four hundred feet wide. He provided a table sixty feet in diameter, upon which I was to act my part, and pallisadoed it round three feet from the edge, and as many high, to prevent my falling over. I was shown ten times a day, to the wonder and satisfaction of all people. I could now speak the language tolerably well, and perfectly understood every word, that was spoken to me. Besides, I had learnt their alphabet, and could make a shift to explain a sentence here and there; for Glumdalclitch had been my instructor while we were at home, and at leisure hours during our journey. She carried a little book in her pocket, not much larger than a Sanson’s Atlas; it was a common treatise for the use of young girls, giving a short account of their religion: out of this she taught me my letters, and interpreted the words. CHAPTER III. The author sent for to court. The queen buys him of his master the farmer, and presents him to the king. He disputes with his majesty’s great scholars. An apartment at court provided for the author. He is in high favour with the queen. He stands up for the honour of his own country. His quarrels with the queen’s dwarf. The frequent labours I underwent every day, made, in a few weeks, a…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #4, from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

…allude to the occurrences of the preceding night. I walked with a quick pace, and we soon arrived at my college. I then reflected, and the thought made me shiver, that the creature whom I had left in my apartment might still be there, alive, and walking about. I dreaded to behold this monster; but I feared still more that Henry should see him. Entreating him therefore to remain a few minutes at the bottom of the stairs, I darted up towards my own room. My hand was already on the lock of the door before I recollected myself. I then paused; and a cold shivering came over me. I threw the door forcibly open, as children are accustomed to do when they expect a spectre to stand in waiting for them on the other side; but nothing appeared. I stepped fearfully in: the apartment was empty; and my bedroom was also freed from its hideous guest. I could hardly believe that so great a good-fortune could have befallen me; but when I became assured that my enemy had indeed fled, I clapped my hands for joy, and ran down to Clerval. We ascended into my room, and the servant presently brought breakfast; but I was unable to contain myself. It was not joy only that possessed me; I felt my flesh tingle with excess of sensitiveness, and my pulse beat rapidly. I was unable to remain for a single instant in the same place; I jumped over the chairs, clapped my hands, and laughed aloud. Clerval at first attributed my unusual spirits to joy on his arrival;…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #5, from A Doll’s House : a play, by Henrik Ibsen

…MRS LINDE. When you introduced him to me yesterday, he declared he had often heard my name mentioned in this house; but afterwards I noticed that your husband hadn’t the slightest idea who I was. So how could Doctor Rank—? NORA. That is quite right, Christine. Torvald is so absurdly fond of me that he wants me absolutely to himself, as he says. At first he used to seem almost jealous if I mentioned any of the dear folk at home, so naturally I gave up doing so. But I often talk about such things with Doctor Rank, because he likes hearing about them. …MRS LINDE. Listen to me, Nora. You are still very like a child in many things, and I am older than you in many ways and have a little more experience. Let me tell you this—you ought to make an end of it with Doctor Rank. NORA. What ought I to make an end of? …MRS LINDE. Of two things, I think. Yesterday you talked some nonsense about a rich admirer who was to leave you money— NORA. An admirer who doesn’t exist, unfortunately! But what then?…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #6, from The Invasion of India, by Alexander the Great as described, by Arrian, Q. Curtius

…could not be replaced, and hence the men were obliged to use cloth woven in barbaric looms wherewith to cut out such dresses for themselves as were worn by Indians. It also so happened that violent storms of rain burst from the clouds for the space of seventy days, accompanied with continual outbreaks of thunder and lightning. Alexander, considering this state of things an obstacle to his designs, placed all his hopes of gaining his ends on winning by benefactions the hearty support of his soldiers. Accordingly he allowed them to plunder the enemy’s country where supplies of all sorts abounded, and on those days when the army was busily engaged in foraging he called together the soldiers’ wives and children, and then promised to give the women an allowance of food month by month, and the children a donative according to the calculations of what their fathers received as the pay of their military rank. When the soldiers who had found a rich and ample booty returned to the camp, he gathered them all together, and in a well-weighed speech addressed the assembly on the subject of the expedition against the Gandaridai; but when the Macedonians would by no means assent to his proposals he renounced his contemplated enterprise. Chapter XCV.—Alexander erects altars and other memorials near the Hypanis, and returns to the Akesinês He then resolved to set up marks to indicate the limits to which he had…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #7, from Ocean Steam Navigation and the Ocean Post, by Thomas Rainey

…ten or twenty times as great as in the case of the vessel that stops and makes her repairs as she requires them. The exertion of a high mail power causes many costly parts to burn out from unrelieved pressure and friction, which would not be the case under other conditions. It is also nearly impossible for the best built engines in the world to make fast time without breaking some important part at every trip or two, or so cracking and injuring it from the continued strain, that a wise precaution requires its removal to make the steamer perfectly sea-worthy. Every practical man knows these difficulties, and every steamship owner estimates their importance according to the immense bills they occasion month by month, or the delays and losses which they cause unless he has expended large amounts of capital in providing other ships to take their place on such occasions of derangement. Nor is the burning out of heavy brass, and composition, and steel pieces, or the breaking of large and troublesome parts in the engine the only source of repairs on a steamship. The boiler department is particularly fruitful in large bills of repairs, especially if it be necessary to attain a good mail speed. It stands to reason that if the whole ship can not be filled with boiler power, which with reasonably high fires, would give enough steam, then the boilers which are used…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #8, from Why Men Fight: A method of abolishing the international duel, by Bertrand Russell

…was not to be won by an imperialist policy. But by our resistance we showed that we shared their standards. We, being in possession, became enamored of the status quo. The Germans were willing to make war to upset the status quo; we were willing to make war to prevent its being upset in Germany’s favor. So convinced were we of the sacredness of the status quo that we never realized how advantageous it was to us, or how, by insisting upon it, we shared the responsibility for the war. In a world where nations grow and decay, where forces change and populations become cramped, it is not possible or desirable to maintain the status quo for ever. If peace is to be preserved, nations must learn to accept unfavorable alterations of the map without feeling that they must first be defeated in war, or that in yielding they incur a humiliation. It is the insistence of legalists and friends of peace upon the maintenance of the status quo that has driven Germany into militarism. Germany had as good a right to an Empire as any other Great Power, but could only acquire an Empire through war. Love of peace has been too much associated with a static conception of international relations. In economic disputes we all know that whatever is vigorous in the wage-earning classes is opposed to “industrial peace,” because the existing distribution of wealth is felt to be unfair. Those who…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #9, from Principles of Geology, by Sir Charles Lyell

…of summer, they are constantly irrigated by the cool waters of melting snows. To others loose sand, so fatal to the generality of species, affords the most proper station. The Carex arenaria and the Elymus arenarius acquire their full vigor on a sandy dune, obtaining an ascendancy over the very plants which in a stiff clay would immediately stifle them. Where the soil of a district is of so peculiar a nature that it is extremely favorable to certain species, and agrees ill with every other, the former get exclusive possession of the ground, and, as in the case of heaths, live in societies. In like manner the bog moss (Sphagnum) is fully developed in peaty swamps, and becomes, like the heath, in the language of botanists, a social plant. Such monopolies, however, are not common, for they are checked by various causes. Not only are many species endowed with equal powers to obtain and keep possession of similar stations, but each plant, for reasons not fully explained by the physiologist, has the property of rendering the soil where it has grown less fitted for the support of other individuals of its own species, or even other species of the same family. Yet the same spot, so far from being impoverished, is improved, for plants of another family. Oaks, for example, render the soil more fertile for the fir tribe, and firs prepare the soil for oaks. Every agriculturist feels the force of this…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #10, from You no longer count, by René Boylesve

…like you." “But they tell me that everything is changed.” “They are right, and you see it clearly because you are outside of Eden, which you had never left before. It is only that some of them accept the change quickly because they were prepared for it, and others because they are less sensitive than you.” “Then, if such a change exists, does that mean that I should cease to mourn my husband?” “No; but the day will come when you will mourn him more. Remember what I say: you will mourn him more. That is the way in which you will take your part in the change.” “More!” ejaculated Odette. “Is it possible? I do not understand you.” “I mean by ‘more’ another manner of mourning, which you will doubtless find more endurable. Let us not talk more about it now, but keep in mind what I have said.” She shrank more and more from society, till she could endure neither news nor the face of a friend. She caused herself to be denied at the door–forbade her maid to speak to her of the war, even to bring in the newspapers. She wished to hear nothing. Then Paris became odious to her because she could not keep herself sufficiently in retirement. Since she was not permitted to go and…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #11, from Let’s Get Together, by Isaac Asimov

…None of Them have ever come to Our conferences on robotics. None that I can remember." “Were They invited?” asked Breckenridge. Lynn, staring and worried, interposed quickly, “Of course.” Breckenridge said, “Do They refuse attendance to any other types of scientific conferences We hold?” “I don’t know,” said Laszlo. He was pacing the floor now. “I haven’t heard of any cases. Have you, Chief?” “No,” said Lynn. Breckenridge said, “Wouldn’t you say it was as though They didn’t want to be put in the position of having to return any such invitation? Or as though They were afraid one of Their men might talk too much?” That was exactly how it seemed, and Lynn felt a helpless conviction that Security’s story was true after all steal over him. Why else had there been no contact between sides on robotics? There had been a cross-fertilizing trickle of researchers moving in both directions on a strictly one-for-one basis for years, dating back to the days of Eisenhower and Khrushchev. There were a great many good motives for that: an honest appreciation of the supra-national character of science; impulses of friendliness that are hard to wipe out completely in the individual human being; the desire to be exposed…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

Excerpt #12, from The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for Serious People, by Oscar Wilde

…Ah! that accounts for it. And now that I think of it I have never heard any man mention his brother. The subject seems distasteful to most men. Cecily, you have lifted a load from my mind. I was growing almost anxious. It would have been terrible if any cloud had come across a friendship like ours, would it not? Of course you are quite, quite sure that it is not Mr. Ernest Worthing who is your guardian? CECILY. Quite sure. [A pause.] In fact, I am going to be his. GWENDOLEN. [Inquiringly.] I beg your pardon? CECILY. [Rather shy and confidingly.] Dearest Gwendolen, there is no reason why I should make a secret of it to you. Our little county newspaper is sure to chronicle the fact next week. Mr. Ernest Worthing and I are engaged to be married. GWENDOLEN. [Quite politely, rising.] My darling Cecily, I think there must be some slight error. Mr. Ernest Worthing is engaged to me. The announcement will appear in the Morning Post on Saturday at the latest. CECILY. [Very politely, rising.] I am afraid you must be under some…

More: Read or Listen on IA →

A production of Friendlyskies.net