It starts when Charles Wallace tells Meg he saw dragons in the twins' garden--unusual for him, Meg thinks, because he usually doesn't confuse reality and fantasy. (Uh, after the events in A Wrinkle in Time, I'd be like dragons! Of course! I certainly wouldn't doubt the kid.) At the end of the passage, Meg: "'Aren't there dragons in the jungle?'" (11). I remember reading this as a kid and being like what the hell is wrong with you? Now, paired with my recently accrued extreme dislike of her... Ugh, Meg, go home. No, wait, don't--that's where all the weird stuff happens. okay, go to... Cambodiatlantis. Forever.
As we know, both Mr and Mrs Murry are scientists. The Mrs is working on mitochondria and farandolae--mitochondria is a term one may recognize from biology. They're kind of like--cells within our cells. They actually have their own RNA codes. They are their own beings within us--we are to them as the Milky Way is to us, you dig? Farandolae (so far as I know) don't actually exist, or don't go by that name, but they're the inhabitants of mitochondria as imagined by Madeleine L'Engle. That is, the mitochondria are 'planets', so to speak. Anyway, what I think is kind of humorous is that since Charles Wallace is a child genius he understands all this--so he tries to explain this all to his teacher. His teacher scolds him and accuses him of making things up. What makes it funny is because mitochondria are totally real, we totally learned about them in biology (though not nearly as much as I would've liked to) and that teacher looks like an idiot. Boy, I better her imaginary face must be quite imaginarily red right now. I BET ALL THOSE MADE-UP KIDS ARE SO EMBARRASSED.
"--It's like the mob after Julius Caesar, she thought,--only Charles isn't much like Caesar. But I'll bet life was simpler when all Gaul was divided into three parts" (22). 1. This is Meg imagining her brother getting beaten up. 2. That little aside about Gaul was completely pointless and unnecessary but absolutely the best thing ever.
Okay, so now is as good a time as ever to explain the ecthroi. I've already done so a little in the last posts--they are the villains, the forces of evil, 'fallen angels'. They un-name (known as Xing) an action which essentially destroys the victim. They work to create void and evil and terror. These creatures in this book take the form of Mr Jenkins, the principal of Charles Wallace's school. They imitate him and use his form to lead the farandolae astray, so they don't procreate, so the mitochondria can't survive, so Charles Wallace can't survive (and as he's fated to be quite important for the world's survival later on, the ecthroi would love for him to die). In this book, Mrs Murry talks about a rip in the universe in which stars are disappearing into without explanation, just--poof! Which is pretty much is what happening inside Charles Wallace, to his mitochondria--you see? Because he is that universe--size is relative--and the ecthroi are the cause in both cases.
There's a spelling error on page 71--no biggie, but I thought it was funny. Meg confuses the principal Mr Jenkins with a very similar Mr Jenkens. "Mr Jenkens? Meg wondered" (71). I'd wonder too, if a mysterious stranger like that called the house.
"'What I really need are lessons in adaption. I've been reading Darwin, but he hasn't helped me much.' 'See what we mean?' Calvin asked Dr. Louise. 'That's hardly what one expects from a six-year-old.' ...'And I still haven't learned how to adapt,' Charles Wallace said" (71). This an example of how really smart people can sometimes be so incredibly stupid. I'm not cutting him slack because he's six, either.
Okay, I can honestly say I never understood these books one hundred percent as a kid. I still don't. But there's one section that bothers me immensely because my fifth grade teacher asked us what it meant and none of our answers were correct, even though they were totally legit and applicable and he was just a terrible human being. But, it's Mr and Mrs Murry talking about how times have changed for the worse--how ten years ago their house didn't even have a lock, and now they feel they must lock up whenever they go out, "irrational violence", pollution, heavy traffic that forces people backwards instead of helping them proceed faster, ten-year-olds pushing drugs (that's a little much) and other examples of unreason. It's exactly what it sounds like. Society is declining, life is getting more dangerous, ecthroi are succeeding. WHAT ABOUT THAT ANSWER WAS NOT CORRECT? God, he was such an awful teacher. I'm not even sure if this is a completely fair thing to say. I'm sure life has been like this always--or much of life, in human history's eye--has been similar. Violent, polluted, small adorable gangs of pickpockets, and so on. The thing is, we are better connected and more well informed in this century than in any other. So it seems like things are all going to hell in a handbasket when really Romans have been curb stomping each other and Medieval men have been murdering strangers in forests and settlers were polluting the land and rivers and adorable bands of child pickpockets have been stealing cash and also opium? I'm not saying we can explain all this away and say it's 'okay' because of this fact, I'm just saying it's a point that should be brought up and thought about because humans have been kicking everyone's butts since the beginning of time.
Charles Wallace brings the twins' pet snake to school to keep the ecthroi impersonating Mr Jenkins from attacking him (she too is a Teacher and enemy of the ecthroi) and is sent home--upon his return home and the explanation as to why he came home (several girls were frightened of Louise) his brother Sandy congratulates him--"'Bully for you, Charles!'" (130). Yeeeeeeees.
After the first task is completed (identifying the correct Mr Jenkins from a troupe of ecthroi-Jenkins) Calvin, Meg, Progo and the real Mr Jenkins enter the mitochondria to meet farandolae. They meet Sporos who explains his existence, how is life will work out, and how it should, and so on.... "Calvin looked horrified. 'You're mad. I've studied biology. You're not possible.' 'Neither are you,' Sporos replied indignantly. 'Nothing important is'" (135).
"'I wish human beings couldn't have feelings. I am having feelings. They hurt'" (200). Wow, talk about crappy prose alert. Woooow. Yeah. Wow.
Anyway, don't really want to spoil much of the ending... or the second task which leads directly to the ending... One thing I still can't figure out is the title. It comes from Le Morte d'Arthur, but why that quote? I mean, Arthur dies, he doesn't get saved at the last moment. At the end, when they are reentering the Murry home, a powerful wind slams the door open--a wind in the door. But I feel like there has to be a better reasoning than just that. (Then again, after reading that fantastic quote off page 200, maybe there isn't.)
This book was still really cool in most every form. A lot of the themes and ideas I comprehend much better, for example the parallels between Charles Wallace's body and the Milky Way--so even after all these years it was just as cool as reading it for the first time. Reading about mitochondria for the first time and Sporos was pretty amazing then too, and it was kind of exciting to still be able to have that feeling. It also made me be the teacher's pet in biology for like three does, so... And it's given me an actual interest in biology (the only science I'm any good at) and I still get excited when I see things written about mitochondria and will devour them. A Wrinkle in Time is good to read, but this is certainly an improvement. A damned good book, for sure.
Citation information: L'Engle, Madeleine. A Wind in the Door. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Inc, 1973. Print.
Notes on my copy: Bar codes weren't common practice in these days, but this copy has a very weird early version of one. Very odd.
Answer to last post's cryptic song lyrics for Emma: I Can Go the Distance from Disney's 'Hercules'
This post's cryptic song lyrics for Emma: Eye of a hurricane, listen to yourself churn--world serves its own needs, regardless of your own needs
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