A Wrinkle in Time (Time Quintet, #1)

by Madeleine L'Engle

She wasn’t usually afraid of weather.—It’s not just the weather, she thought.—It’s the weather on top of everything else. On top of me. On top of Meg Murry doing everything wrong.

aw poor kid

—Why can’t I hide it, too? Meg thought. Why do I always have to show everything?

“Okay, okay,” Calvin sighed. “I must remember I’m preconditioned in my concept of your mentality.”

LMAO love that he is self aware but this is such unnatural sentence for a child

“When I get this feeling, this compulsion, I always do what it tells me. I can’t explain where it comes from or how I get it, and it doesn’t happen very often. But I obey it.

Foreshadowing?

Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connait point. French. Pascal. The heart has its reasons, whereof reason knows nothing.”

“Lead on, moron,” Calvin cried gaily. “I’ve never even seen your house, and I have the funniest feeling that for the first time in my life I’m going home!”

Aw

You don’t know how lucky you are to be loved.”

But you see, Meg, just because we don’t understand doesn’t mean that the explanation doesn’t exist.”

Fire line

“If Charles Wallace is a sport, I think I’m a biological mistake.”

Jesus.

“Anndd wee mussttn’tt looose ourr sensses of hummorr,” Mrs Which said. “Thee onnlly wway ttoo ccope withh ssometthingg ddeadly sseriouss iss ttoo ttry ttoo trreatt itt a llittlle lligghtly.”

True!!!

Mrs Which shook her head. “Nnott heeere, Megg. Llett Mrs Whatsitt expllainn. Shee isss yyoungg annd thee llanguage of worrds iss eeasierr fforr hherr thann itt iss fforr Mrs Whoo andd mee.” “We stopped here,” Mrs Whatsit explained, “more or less to catch our breaths. And to give you a chance to know what you’re up against.”

Hey so this is pissing me off. We hve spent five pages begging for an explanation and no one is explaining. Either move on or explain damn!!!

“Sing unto the Lord a new song, and his praise from the end of the earth, ye that go down to the sea, and all that is therein; the isles, and the inhabitants thereof.

Was not expecting the creatures behond human comprehension to sing decades old christian hymns but ok

But of course we can’t take any credit for our talents. It’s how we use them that counts.

true

“Therre willl nno llonggerr bee sso manyy pplleasanntt thinggss too llookk att iff rressponssible ppeoplle ddo nnott ddoo ssomethingg abboutt thee unnppleassanntt oness.”

!!!!

“Stay angry, little Meg,” Mrs Whatsit whispered. “You will need all your anger now.”

Learning about honoring the anger of your young self! This is strangely relevant

You must stay with Meg and Calvin. You must not go off on your own. Beware of pride and arrogance, Charles, for they may betray you.”

How ominous

Charles Wallace took it, made another face, but managed to swallow. “Still tastes like sand,” he said. He looked at the man. “Why?” “You know perfectly well why. You’ve shut your mind entirely to me. The other two can’t. I can get in through the chinks. Not all the way in, but enough to give them a turkey dinner.

So he cant eat the dinner because his mind is shut out to the red eye guy but he is somehow the most susceptible to being hypnotized by the red eye guy? You're losing me.

You don’t understand what a wonderful place we’ve come to. You see, on this planet everything is in perfect order because everybody has learned to relax, to give in, to submit. All you have to do is look quietly and steadily into the eyes of our good friend here, for he is our friend, dear sister, and he will take you in as he has taken me.”

Interesting. This is a kid's book so i guess this would be someones first intro to the idea of free will vs independence. We are meant to side with free will, as usual. Makes me think about the other side of it though. Is thatt too cmplex for this audince?

“Nobody suffers here,” Charles intoned. “Nobody is ever unhappy.” “But nobody’s ever happy, either,” Meg said earnestly. “Maybe if you aren’t unhappy sometimes you don’t know how to be happy. Calvin, I want to go home.”

Truth

“No!” she cried triumphantly. “Like and equal are not the same thing at all!” “Good girl, Meg!” her father shouted at her.

Hell yeah

“From what you’ve told me it’s because Charles Wallace thought he could deliberately go into IT and return. He trusted too much to his own strength—

Bruh

Her father: “Just what I say. We’re children playing with dynamite. In our mad rush we’ve plunged into this

Me when AI

She teetered on the seesaw of love and hate, and the Black Thing pushed her down into hate.

She did not realize that she was as much in the power of the Black Thing as Charles Wallace.

And the crowd snaps their fingers.

am a human being, and a very fallible one. But I agree with Calvin. We were sent here for something. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Okay! Okay? Another weirdly christian moment for a sci fi kids book. Where are we going with this? Very 60s i guess?

But we know that just because we want something does not mean that we will get what we want, and we still do not know what to do.

Tell her! She is pissing me off

“Oh, yes,” Aunt Beast replied. “In doing that we can never relax. We are the called according to His purpose, and whom He calls, them He also justifies. Of course we have help, and without help it would be much more difficult.”

The alies beyond human coomprehnsion are alo christian? Okay. Yeah okay sure sure i'm with you.

“We look not at the things which are what you would call seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal. But the things which are not seen are eternal.”

It's giving Bible!

Now her worries about Charles Wallace and her disappointment in her father’s human fallibility rose like gorge in her throat.

I dont particularly like this message. If the loved ones around you make mistakes because they are human, look to the perfect christian aliens to save you? … maybe it gets better…

Meg’s tears stopped as abruptly as they had started. “But I do understand.” She felt tired and unexpectedly peaceful. Now the coldness that, under Aunt Beast’s ministrations, had left her body had also left her mind. She looked toward her father and her confused anger was gone and she felt only love and pride. She smiled at him, asking forgiveness, and then pressed up against Aunt Beast.

This character development would be welcme if it made any sense. How did she switch up so fast

“You mean you’re comparing our lives to a sonnet? A strict form, but freedom within it?”

I like this metaphor

The foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called, but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are.”

So God is canonically in this book. I feel like that muddles the premise. Where does God come to play here?

Where was Charles Wallace, her own beloved Charles Wallace? What is it I have got that IT hasn’t got?

Dude it's love

She knew! Love. That was what she had that IT did not have.

Duh