Here's another book I read in--well, I read this one in fifth grade, actually. Unlike the last few kids' books I've done, however, I haven't read it since. Although I bought it shortly after reading it at school, it disappeared. I can only assume it was Xed.
This book is about Meg Murry, her brother Charles Wallace, and Calvin O'Keefe. The back story is that Mr Murry, their scientist father, has been missing for many years, ever since he started work on 'tesseracts'--wrinkles in time, ways to travel without going the distance--moving twenty spaces instead of one, say, like in a board game. Charles meets a mysterious old woman named Mrs Whatsit who promises to send them to their missing father with a chance to save him.
This book starts out with "It was a dark and stormy night" (3). I'm curious as to whether it was playing off the cliche or it started it. (When did Peanuts comics start getting published?)
There's a semi-important character known as the Happy Medium. Long before the kids (They are all under age 15; Charles Wallace is only five--an extreme example of a wunderkind, though) meet her, Mrs Murry lectures Meg on trying to find a 'happy medium'. Immediately I was like "Oh, maybe it's like Wizard of Oz!" You know, was it a dream or not, all those people were people she knew, and so on... After rereading the book, I've come to the conclusion that there's no way that this was in Meg's head. Why even bring it up, you ask? Shut up is why.
At one point, Mrs Whatsit tips her chair over. "'Are you all right, Mrs Whatsit?' 'If you have some liniment I'll put it on my dignity.' ... 'Do please get up,' Charles said. 'I don't like to see you lying there that way. You're carrying things too far.' 'Have you ever tried to get to your feet with a sprained dignity?'" (19).
Mrs Whatsit has cohorts by the name of Mrs Who (Doctor?) and Mrs Which. Mrs Who communicates mainly in quotes, in fact, I can't really recall a time in which she doesn't. This particular quote is Euripides: "Nothing is hopeless; we must hope for everything."
The Happy Medium, true to her name, has a crystal ball and so on--when asked to look at the earth, she becomes agitated and complains of having to look at unpleasant things. Mrs Which answers--Mrs Which's voice is always an awkward slur, acting extra letters like thhhisss, so I'll strip it down and cut out the extras, yes?: "There will no longer be so many pleasant things to look at if responsible people do not do something about the unpleasant ones."
The planet the climax of the story comes on is on Camazotz, a planet already enveloped by the Ecthroi--even though they won't be called that till A Wind in the Door. The important thing to know is that they are evil, a cancer of the universe--in A Wind in the Door they're described as 'fallen angels' (there are a lot of Christian over and undertones in this series that I somehow missed as a child, even though they're pretty obvious. Like "I was the dumbest kid ever" obvious). The planet name comes from the Mayans, according to Wikipedia it's a "Mayan bat god". Knowing the Mayans, this means that this planet bearing the name is a bad place. And it is. Think 1984 to the absolute extremes--kids play in sync, throw newspapers in sync, people go home at the same time, lights go off at the same time--and if anything is ever put out of order, even if a child mistakenly drops a ball or misses a jump while skipping rope, they are punished to the greatest degrees. Even the mothers look alike.
Charles Wallace is possessed by the Echroi, or the creature that has already been seduced my the ecthroi--a tall man and a giant, disembodied brain. That I didn't remember, and I found it incredibly frightening--something akin to young Gage after he's brought back from the dead in Pet Sematary. Okay, so Charles doesn't cut Herman Munster's Achille's tendon or anything, but the way I picture them isn't dissimilar, especially since they aren't really that far apart in age. Physically, I had the same basic image, and then Gage adopts very strange eyes among other things because he was resurrected from the dead (you just can't expect to be completely unaffected after that sort of thing!); Charles Wallace's pupils shrink to the point of invisibility. (Which is really creepy in its own right!) He also becomes possessed of ITs and the man's greater knowledge, which is really really creepy because I kind of forgot Charles Wallace was so young. I mean, I remembered he was a child prodigy but jeez!
Calvin calls Charles Wallace 'Charlibus'. What?
"'In your language you have a form of poetry called the sonnet... It is a very strict form of poetry, is it not? There are fourteen lines, I believe, all in iambic pentameter. That's a very strict rhythm or meter, yes? ...And each line has to end with a rigid rhyme pattern. And if the poet does not do it exactly this way, it is not a sonnet, is it? ...But within this strict form the poet has complete freedom to say whatever he wants, doesn't he? ...So,' Mrs Whatsit said. 'So what?' 'Oh, do not be stupid, boy!' Mrs Whatsit scolded. You know perfectly well what I am driving at!' 'You mean you're comparing our lives to a sonnet? A strict form, but freedom within it?' 'Yes,' Mrs Whatsit said. 'You're given the form, but you have to write the sonnet yourself. What you say is completely up to you'" (192).
So, there we go. This book held up all right--I mean, my affection for it wasn't unfounded or forgotten. It didn't do the same to me as before, but I guess that's not surprising--I remembered much of the story. Some parts seemed overwrought, some of the writing seemed strangely CS Lewis-esque (which may just be because I read this for the first time and Narnia for the first time in very close proximity, so it could just be association rather than actual style--also could be because of those Christian overtones, though arguably L'Engle is even more forward than CS Lewis in that department). The book seemed a lot shorter than before, and I found myself hating Meg a lot more. I mean, I kind of liked her. But after rereading this and A Wind in the Door, I'm just like, "Take a chill pill, lady! You're a HUGE bitch!" Seriously! She does nothing but hem and haw and whine and screech--she wants to save X, but when the situation completely relies on her, she begs someone else to do it for her, she doesn't want to do this or that--have him do it instead--uggggghhhhh. I can't even decide if I hate her less than Pip from Great Expectations, that's how much I hate her. They have the same whiny personality, ughhhhh..... But yeah... it's still pretty good. I'm not that upset; I got it for like 50... 50 cents. Why is there no cents button the keyboard? What the hell? Have keyboards always been like that...? I can't see myself rereading it in the near future, but I'm glad I did--it makes more sense now, though it's not nearly the hardest in the series. A good book to have around the house.
Citation information: L'Engle, Madeleine. A Wrinkle in Time. USA: Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc, 1997. Print.
Answer to last post's cryptic song lyrics for Emma: I'm Like a Bird by Nelly Furtado (Oh wait, why include the answer! She got this one! Cheers to the first! : )
This post's cryptic song lyrics for Emma: Like a shooting star, I will go the distance--I will search the world, I will face its heart
PS. Might it be noted that this is the first post from Leopold, my new laptop. Yeah, he's named after who you think he's named after.
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