A Wrinkle in Time

We're no strangers to books with religious overtones or stories meant to impart a moral lesson, but this episode's journey to Camazotz with Madeleine L'Engle's classic work A Wrinkle in Time is definitely the most overtly religious book we've tackled.  Jesus, Charles Wallace... or Jesus= Charles Wallace? We're not entirely sure. We're also not entirely sure if our extreme irritation with a 5 year old makes us terrible people. This book is a straight up romp where plot is concerned, but we lose the signal a bit with what the author is saying about gender roles, the nature of evil, faith, physics, and the world. We're discussing all things Who, Which and Whatsit, tesseracts, pulsating brains, and soft fluffy beasts to try to figure it out though!

These Books Made Me is a podcast about the literary heroines who shaped us and is a product of the Prince George's County Memorial Library System podcast network. Stay in touch with us via Twitter @PGCMLS with #TheseBooksMadeMe or by email at TheseBooksMadeMe@pgcmls.info. For recommended readalikes and deep dives into topics related to each episode, visit our blog at https://pgcmls.medium.com/.

We mentioned a lot of topics in this episode. Here’s a brief list of some informative articles and videos about some of them if you want to do your own further research:

The enduring impact of the book: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/remarkable-influence-wrinkle-in-time-180967509/

A remarkable journey: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2007/09/rereading-madeleine-l-engle.html

Sci-fi or no?: https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/66705/how-wrinkle-time-changed-sci-fi-forever

Transcript

Hannah 0:14

Hi, I'm Hannah.

Heather 0:16

I'm Heather.

Hannah 0:17

And this is our podcast, These Books Made Me. Today we're diving into Madeleine L' Engle's a Wrinkle in Time. Friendly warning as always, this podcast contains spoilers. If you don't yet know who has the taste for liverwurst and cream cheese sandwiches, proceed with caution. We have special guests with us today. Can you introduce yourself?

Debra 0:39

I'm Debra

Idalis 0:41

< laugh>. Hi, I'm Idalis from Bladensburg. I don't know why, I forgot what my branch name was for a second there.< laugh>. Yes. Nice to be here.

Debra 0:54

Was this everyone's first time reading? If not, how's reread compared to your memories of reading it when you were younger?

Heather 1:01

This was definitely not my first time reading it. I loved this book when I was little. I loved the whole set of books that she did about the Murray family, which I think is the Kairos quintet is what that is> But yeah, I love these books. I, I had very much read and much loved copies of all of the books in this series. And I think rereading it was a treat< laugh>. There were certain things that I had not held onto. I think I told Hannah, I didn't remember how overtly religious it was. I had remembered a Wind in the door, which is the sequel to this is being extremely religious.

1:41

Mm- hmm.

Heather 1:41

Like, there's actual cherubim in it. And like I thought that was when all of that kicked in. So this was a much more overtly Christian read than I remembered it being, from reading it in the past. Um, but I still found the book enjoyable. It moves really fast and I, I still enjoy the characters in it.

Hannah 2:00

Yeah. Um, like Heather, I read it as a kid. I read the whole, uh, Murray series. It held up on reread for me in a lot of ways. I think she's, she's a wonderful writer. It was definitely a formative text for me. And I don't think that, like you mentioned the Christianity, and I think it's definitely something we need to talk about later. I don't, I remembered it as being very strongly Christian in its themes, but my reaction to it this time was very different. I think

Debra 2:30

Th this was the third time I read A Wrinkle in Time. I remembered it as being to mind blowing when I was a kid. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And I read through what I think at that time, I'm not sure when Book four and five were written, but I'm pretty sure it was a trilogy when I read, I think the only, the first three. So I breathed through the first three quickly. And for me, who was not really an avid reader as a kid, it just, it blew my mind. And then I read it a few decades after that and it was not as good an experience for me. And so I was a little bit nervous about reading it this third time, 20 years since the second time. And, um, it's weird that the things I remember from both the other readings, I, I, I forgot so much. Even though this is the third time reading it. It's, but certain things stuck out with for me. And I, I still, uh, I have a slightly different, I always remember Charles Wallace and his name and thinking he was a great character, but I didn't remember exactly his role in this book very well. So yeah, it was interesting to reread.

Speaker 1 3:38

Yeah.

Idalis 3:39

So this is my first time reading this book. Uh, not the first time I've ever heard of it. It was actually pretty easy, pretty breezy to get through. I found it interesting. I think that if I had read this when I was younger, I would've enjoyed it a lot more. I still enjoyed it. I'm still glad I read it. There were certain times since I half read it, half listened to it. I think the experience is a little bit different, only because the narrator also sounded a little raspy almost. I don't know the narrator kind of makes or breaks the audiobook, but overall was a really good book. Certain things were, they were surprising. But then again, I think just the day and age that were in certain topics aren't easily as brought up as before. So I actually kind of enjoyed, you know, some of the things that they brought up.

Hannah 4:31

Okay. So we're going to get into an author bio. Madeline Langel camp was born on November 29th, 1918 in New York City to Madeline Hall, Barnett Camp, and Charles Wadsworth camp, her mother with the pianist. And Madeline Langel was her first child. Madeline's father. Charles Wadsworth Camp was the newspaper reporter who wrote about drama and music for the Herald Evening son. Madeline's childhood was one with the sort of exposure to the arch that living in New York City with artistically inclined parents could provide. She began writing at the extremely young age of five, like Meg Murray. Madeline did not always excel in school and sometimes clash with her teachers. Her mother defended her against accusations of plagiarism after Madeline, um, won a poetry contest in fifth grade. And a teacher expressed that she did not believe that Madeline was capable of having written a winning poem. In 1936, the year before she graduated, Madeline's father died as she went on to attend Smith College with a major in English the following year in 1941, after graduating from Smith, Madeline moved back to her birthplace New York City and began to work as an actress.

Speaker 1 5:50

Although her goal was to be a writer, well acting on Broadway writing plays. And her first novel, the Small Rain, published 1945 Le Engel meant Hugh Franklin, an actor and the two married in 1946 for a time they would summer in Connecticut and winter in New York. Their daughter Josephine was born in 1947 and their son, Bion, was born in 1952. Their third child, Maria, was adopted at the age of seven after the death of her mother, who was friend with Lingo and Franklin and whose husband had also passed away. Recently, Lang's writing career continued to progress and her book Meet The Austins achieved critical acclaim, making the American Library Association's 1960 notable children's Books List, Langel wrote A Wrinkle In Time on a cam trip with her family in 1959. It would be rejected by 26 publishers before Perra Straus and Grow. Took a chance on the manuscript and published it. In 1962, A Wrinkle in Time won the Newberry Medal, the Louis Carroll SCH Award, the Hans Christian Anderson Runner Up Award, and the American Library Association's Notable book Award Langel wrote three follow up books to A Wrinkle In Time, A Wind in the Door, 1973, A Swiftly Tilting Planet 1978 and Many Waters. Langel was awarded the Margaret A. Edwards Award, which recognizes significant lifelong contributions to young adult literature. In 1998. She died at the age of 88 in 2007 in Lichfield, Connecticut.

Speaker 2 7:38

Okay, I'm gonna dive into a plot summary, but caveat, this book is very plotty and a lot happens, so we'll synopsize it as best as possible. 13 year old Meg Murray lives with her scientist mother, popular twin brothers, Dennis and Sandy, and Renkin five-year-old brother, Charles Wallace, her father, a government physicist, has disappeared without a trace, and his absence has become a source of pain for his family. And rumors in their small town. Meg's brilliant, but struggles mightily in school due to her flaws, anger, stubbornness, impatience, and non-conformity. Me's painfully aware of her physical awkwardness and her inability to fit in, but it's simply not in her to change who she is. Charles Wallace, who has telepathic gifts, has been venturing into the woods where he has encountered a strange woman named Mrs. Weit, who appears at their home during a storm. Charles Wallace later leads Meg to the home of Mrs. Watson, Mrs. Who, and Mrs. Witch. And they encounter 14 year old genius Calvin O'Keefe, who quickly falls from Meg and becomes part of the Murray family. Meg Calvin and Charles Wallace are taken by the otherworldly misses to another planet via tesser act. The same phenomenon their father was studying before his disappearance on the planet ure. They observed flying centar like beings of light and joy and learned this is Mrs. Watson's true form from the planet. They observed the black thing a creeping shadow of evil. They visit another planet and are shown earth en shrouded by the shadow of the black thing in the crystal ball of the happy medium. Mrs. Watson, who, and which explained to the children that to save Dr. Murray, they will have to fight against the black thing on Cazo where he is being held prisoner. The three witches give the children gifts before Tess them to Kaos a stepford nightmare of a planet in which everyone behaves identically down to children bouncing balls. In perfect unison, the children go to the Central Central Intelligence Agency and meet the man with red eyes, who attempts to bring them undermine control for the unseen being it while Meg and Calvin resists,Charles Wallace gives in and leads them to IT's lair. IT is a disembodied brain controlling the planet via mind control. And Dr. Murray is trapped in a transparent column next to it. Meg is able to break through to her father with the help of Mrs. Who's special glasses. And Dr. Murray tessers them to a planet of furry Islas beast leaving Charles Wallace behind and paralyzing Meg. In the process the beast care for the trio and the Mrs. Witches reappear and charge Meg with rescuing Charles Wallace, she returns to Kao's and is able to free him from its control with the power of her love. And Mrs. Witch returns all of them home to earth. So we'll start off with how did this book hold up on reread?

Speaker 1 10:28

I think Madeline Langel was a woman who was gender norm defying herself. She reproduced that in a lot of ways in her characters, even the ones that were themselves defying it. And, and some of the times it was in a kind of a side character like, like with Sandy and Dennis, who were, you know, don't fight Meg. It's our job to fight. Like they're, they're, you know, they're Bly telling Meg and their mother that it's their job to I guess be the men of the household or whatever. I found that very strange.

Speaker 2 11:01

But do you feel like that got inverted? Because I did. I thought that that was kind of tongue in cheek that the 10 year olds are saying, we'll fight for you cuz me ended up with this black eye for fighting a kid that said Charles Wallace was a moron, I think, which also not a word that we would mm-hmm.<affirmative> choose to use now. But then the book is about Meg ultimately being the warrior for good. Like she's the only one that can save Charles Wallace. So like, I felt like that was at least inverted by the end of the book for me, where Meg's really the fighter of the group. She's the, the one that had the most meaningful success in a fight, even if, you know, she did end up with a black eye in the, in the physical fight.

Speaker 1 11:44

Yeah. So I think it's inverted there, but I think it goes unquestioned in say the Murray household. Like the mother doesn't comment on some of the things that her children say and do in a way that I think maybe you wouldn't let that go

Speaker 2 12:03

As a modern parent. Yeah. I didn't like the only male humans, I guess, cuz I've, I have to distinguish from the three beings that take female forms, but I don't really know that they are gendered beyond what they choose to appear as. But the, the male human characters are the only ones that are given the gift of sight. Right? Like Charles Wallace and Calvin are both described as having some type of telepathic abilities or abilities to read people. Dr. Murray is described as having some additional something I guess in that sort of area as well. Like more than his wife has. She's a great scientist, but he has this extra mph that like lets him tesser the way a, you know, an otherworldly heavenly being can, and they're saying like, oh, he just needs to learn to control it a little bit better. But the implication is definitely that he's doing something supernatural. Not that he's just that good of a scientist, that he accomplished this, he's doing something that's within him. So I didn't love that. Like, the men are sort of given the like, innate gifts and the women are just smart, you know, that, that read weird to me, even though I do think me's meant to be the heroin of the book.

Speaker 3 13:33

Uh, you mentioned the men and this, this is an ex, this is sort of diverging from, from what you all are talking about here. But there was something I think Heather had noted, not during this conversation, but in our notes, that there was something about the list of names of people who had fought the dark, the black thing. And I don't know, that rubbed me wrong also. And I think it, it wasn't that it was all these Western white men, but it was all these people and this, I think dated it a bit that are well known to Western white<laugh>, uh, civilization. There was, it, it seemed, it seemed very narrow reading it today than I think it would have the first time I went through it.

Speaker 2 14:17

That's a really good point.

Speaker 3 14:19

So that was

Speaker 2 14:20

A little one. Madame Cury was the only, yeah.

Speaker 3 14:22

There was one that made the Madame Cur was, was the only one who made the list. And I thought there should be more women in here. So that's what made me think of it together.

Speaker 2 14:29

I also didn't like that there was a point where, back on gender stuff where Calvin makes a comment that people know that the, like the dad didn't really run off on the mom for an affair. They just like to talk because anyone that saw Meg's mom would know that a guy wouldn't leave her because she's so pretty. And it's like, okay, you've already said this woman has like mult multiple doctoral degrees. And he's like, well, yeah, your mom's hot. So like, clearly no one would cheat on her. Yeah, that rubbed me wrong. I

Speaker 3 15:05

Forgot about that. But yes, that

Speaker 2 15:09

Who seems to have no real, like, he loves Meg because of her mind and her character, not because of her appearance, but then he is like, well, nobody would leave the hot mom, which is gross.

Speaker 4 15:25

Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. It is, I feel like there's a lot of different themes. Like there's family, there's gender norms and all these things. Then it can be such an expansive theme, especially, uh, as since the sixties up until now, you see a change with those themes or more inclusiveness. It's interesting because the author Lango, she brings up those themes and then, I don't know, maybe because it was written in the sixties, it's almost like a dated, uh, conceptualization of those themes that are just a little different now. Like they have the family structure, they have the mom, they have the dad, the kids, and the mom is extremely smart and she's a scientist and everybody, it's almost like she only gets respect, like you mentioned from her appearance, but then it's almost because she's not part of the story throughout, it's kind of like they push her to the side even though she has all these great achievements and incredibly intelligent, but she's not in the picture. She's at home crying, not letting the kids talk, like see her when she's upset and trying to hide those emotions. And then we have Dr. Murray, who they all know as a scientist, and they don't question it at all. They don't bring up his appearance.

Speaker 3 16:34

Th that was, you sort of touched on this, but it was like she was, I guess this is part of why it seemed dated to me too, but Langle, the author was sounding sort of prog prog. Well, progressive and, but then it was so stilted because it was not specifically it not progressive by today's, yeah, today's standard. I guess it's progressive

Speaker 2 16:56

In the look ladies, you really can have it all. Like you can be hot, can have kids and still be hot and you can have a career and you can keep your house and you can make the stew in your chemistry lap. Like Yeah. I think we've come off of like that being

Speaker 3 17:13

And Meg's the maths, you know the point. Yeah.

Speaker 4 17:17

<laugh>,

Speaker 3 17:18

The girls do math<laugh>.

Speaker 4 17:21

That's crazy

Speaker 3 17:22

Guys.

Speaker 4 17:23

That's, that's exactly how it feels like actually, honestly, I don't

Speaker 2 17:26

Think cooking stew in your

Speaker 4 17:28

Chemistry lab is a good move though.<laugh>?

Speaker 3 17:30

No,

Speaker 4 17:31

I'm sanitary. Very

Speaker 2 17:32

Generally speaking,

Speaker 4 17:34

No. And then he also have Charles Wallace, he's a baby, quote unquote baby. Extremely smart. Of course he has this communication bustle that he can use. He can read other people's minds, I believe. But he's so smart and he's so much smarter than his sister. It's like they try to point that out to a certain extent and it's just like, I thought she was a genius. Uh, I mean she is, but then I kind of like discredit her a little bit using the male characters regardless of age. Yeah.

Speaker 2 18:03

Mm-hmm.<affirmative> again, it's crazy. It's like, yeah, Megan, her mom are geniuses in their own right, but they're not special. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Exactly. The only special people are the men in the book. I'll also say it makes them kind of insufferable. Like Charles Wallace is pretty irritating. Yes.<laugh>, I didn't remember that so much. Like, I didn't remember as a kid being like, guy, I hate Charles Wallace, but reading it this time, I was like, honestly, like it's a miracle. Nobody has popped that kid in the mouth for just like, being weird all the time. Mm-hmm.<affirmative> and, and acting so arrogant.

Speaker 4 18:37

It just,

Speaker 2 18:38

It it's like this, I mean, I guess he's not at school and they are concerned he'd get beat up, but it's like, I feel like that's one of those things, like if they send him to school and he's like that, all of that sort of hubris is going to just get knocked right out of him because no one's going to, no one's gonna tolerate that. You can't just go around as like, I'm the king of the world. Yeah. I'm so much smarter than all of you. Little peons<laugh>. And that is his attitude.

Speaker 4 19:06

That is

Speaker 2 19:07

It. Even, even when he is not undermine control. That seems to be his attitude. Absolut. Absolutely. It's like, ah, Meg can't understand things and poor mom, she's so simple. She's sad about dad. You know, it's, yeah. It's not a

Speaker 4 19:17

Good look. It's a little patronizing. Just a bit. I I think that they even say one of his faults when he goes into, was it the first time they went to Camons cam, Amazon? They had mentioned him like, you have to be careful. You can't be too arrogant. Yeah. You can't be too prideful because it's gonna get the best of you. And then he gets arrogant and he gets prideful and he's like, sorry guys. I, I, I didn't make it to second grade yet, so I'm gonna try to dumb it down for you<laugh>. And goes in to try to explain things. I'm like, well, that's like the opposite Yeah. Of what they told you to do. Yeah.

Speaker 3 19:49

I found myself saying, because I found him incredibly annoying too this time around. But Charles Wallace, that's what I remember from being a kid, is That's brilliant. Middle name Charles Wallace. I guess I wanted to identify with him somehow, but this time I kept, I was almost angry at myself for being so upset with a five-year-old, trying to remember, this is just a five-year-old. He's, you know, they don't have it all together yet, but what<laugh>. But, uh, but he's supposed to, um,

Speaker 2 20:13

Well he doesn't come across as human at all. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And, and I get that they've sort of given him this gift of sight or whatever. But then I also have questions about when they rattle off the list of people who have been fighting and like, oh, Jesus is the first

Speaker 4 20:29

They said Jesus three times.

Speaker 2 20:30

That

Speaker 4 20:31

Comes to mind.

Speaker 2 20:32

<laugh>, it's like, is Charles Wallace supposed to be like, what another imagines Jesus and Buddha and Gandhi and these people to be like, because

Speaker 4 20:43

It's just that male figure that's above all.

Speaker 2 20:45

Yeah, it's, it's a lot weird. Like I, I don't feel like anyone would follow Charles Wallace because

Speaker 4 20:51

He got himself into

Speaker 2 20:52

Trouble. He doesn't get people for all of his, like I can read people, he's bad at people. Calvin is the one that actually is good at people.

Speaker 4 21:02

He is personable. Yeah. It's a serious case of exceptionalism.

Speaker 2 21:06

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 4 21:07

<affirmative>, it's like the GT club. Do, do you guys know what I mean when I say gt gifted and talent? Yeah. You know the, oh, sorry. For sure. They definitely did talk about that. There was actually a point when they were on cam Amazon and they had just reunited with Mrs. Witch who, and what it, and they had said that, oh well your differences make you, you know, unique and uh, we know Meg, that you feel bad that you're different from everybody else, but do you see how everybody's the same here? You could be happy and whatnot. And she's like, yeah, but I don't, I find it difficult to be different, but I don't wanna be like everybody else. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, I think that's one of the lines that she said, which I actually genuinely liked that I was like, okay. But then I found that lingo, there was just a few different places where what she was trying to say and what's happening just didn't meet. I just don't know. I don't know what she was going for. Totally. I think is what I'm getting at. Like, what did you mean by that

Speaker 2 22:06

<laugh>? Yeah. There were a lot of times where I just was really confused about what the take home was supposed to be. Exactly. In a certain interaction. Yeah. Like we get that, which I think is a valid point that you don't want everybody to be

Speaker 4 22:20

Yeah. The

Speaker 2 22:21

Same like children of the corn basically<laugh>, everyone does the same thing. So I feel like that's supposed to be an important message there. But yeah, I don't know that that comes through all the time. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, because Calvin again to me seems like one of the more successful human beings in the book. If the alternative is, you'd act like Charles Wallace all the time. So I don't know like what good is his specialness? Yeah. If, if no one likes him, you know, are we supposed to believe that that makes everyone evil for not seeing how special Charles Wallace is? Or are we supposed to believe that like Charles Wallace is particularly susceptible to evil because he has hubris, like the messages seemed very mixed to me as well, where I just am not quite sure at the end of the day what she was Yeah. Wanting the reader to walk away with.

Speaker 4 23:13

I think that's, that's the general feeling throughout the book is what I got. Honestly. Although there was some good parts, like in the beginning they referred to Charles Wallace in a more, I feel like she was trying to bring in conversation about ableism and disabled and those who, you know, might be seen, um, in a different intellectual capability. And I thought we were gonna get into that a little bit cuz that's how she introduced Charles Wallace, that everybody made fun of him. They thought that he was on a different, you know, intelligent capacity of some sort of some sorts, but then just kind of dies down like it's not fully complete. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, if that makes like the, the thought hasn't been fully conceptualized just yet, it could have gone a lot further, but then I go sixties, who knows? Maybe that is the furthest it could have gone at that point. But it was just something that I found really interesting.

Speaker 2 24:05

Now I think this book needs to be a lot longer than it is, which is not something I don't think I've said about any of the books that we've read before. I've complained that some of'em probably needed tightening up Uhhuh<affirmative>, this one. I think I get the feeling that it got edited down. I get that to where the back half you're just flying. Yeah. Like I said, with the plot, plot summary, so much is crammed in to the back half of the book and we sort of lose the character development that we have at the beginning of the book. Yeah. And I think it hurts it because that is where I'm getting confused. Yeah. Because now I don't know, I don't really see what arc the characters who aren't Meg have had.

Speaker 4 24:45

I think the world building absolutely does. Like, I feel like it's pretty deeply well rooted into Yeah. The world that she creates in the book. Like it's, it's pretty well-rounded now. It does say on the back of my book it's ages 10 to 14. So obviously I'm 25 years old and I'm looking at this book in a adult fiction kind of lens. If I had read it when I was 10 to 14 years old, maybe I wouldn't have needed all that information for it to make sense for me. You know, when you see certain things, certain big things will catch a kid's attention and be like, okay, they can connect the dots, which is great, you know, inference. But I think just if it were categorized as an adult fiction, then we can have some problems with

Speaker 2 25:25

It.<laugh>. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a really valid point. I think that we read differently as children. Yeah.

Speaker 4 25:31

Just

Speaker 2 25:32

Generally speaking. And I feel as a child, everybody

Speaker 4 25:35

Liked it when they were younger.

Speaker 2 25:37

Mean I think I infused a lot of what's happening in the book with my own frame of reference mm-hmm.<affirmative> and my own feelings about myself. And I think when I was a child, much more of my reading experience was about seeing myself in work, figuring out who I was via what I was reading. Which I don't think I do so much as an adult anymore. Like mm-hmm.<affirmative>, that's just not like, that's great. I why I point, I'm at this point and certainly things inform me when I read them, but it's not the same sort of searching or yearning that I have when I come to a book.

Speaker 4 26:12

I can definitely see that because this is around middle school time. Middle school time is confusing. It's a lot of confusion. You have a lot of questions. You feel very odd. Everybody feels odd. Everybody feels like they're not part of everybody. And you definitely see that with Meg. She feels different. She doesn't really feel like she connects PE people at school. She has issues with the teacher. She's seen as an outsider. And the book really embraces being an outsider and acknowledging our faults, acknowledging our strengths, and I think being comfortable with who we are. And that's great if that's the selling point. That's great. I love that. Of course, individuality is amazing. You know, be yourself and embrace yourself. That's great. It's just like she does it for Meg and then she doesn't do it for everybody else, but then she does and it's halfway done. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, I don't know Nita would be fleshed out. It would be really, really cool if that could have been done.

Speaker 2 27:04

We get little snippets of that. Like, I think that very brief scene where you see Calvin's family. Yes. And his reaction to that when they're with the happy medium and she shows, I mean it's very brief. It's like one paragraph. Yeah. And it shows his mother is just be dragged. She's missing her teeth, she's beating her other skin, the younger kids with like a spoon I think. And she's screaming and it's clear that, you know, the family is in chaos and everyone's unhappy there. And his reaction to that, he says something basically along the lines of, no, it's okay. I want you to know. Like he wants to be seen. Yeah. For who he is. Who he is really. He, you know, he's spending a lot of his time hiding parts of himself from people so that he will fit in and he's, you know, he likes basketball, but like he's doing the right things to be part of the crowd and fit in so that he can have his specialness and not get beat down for it. Which is probably also what's happening to him at home. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, um, where he's just, you know, the freak brother, not, you know, it's not valued. And I think that that was a really beautiful moment for him because the rest of the time we don't get a lot of good development for him. Especially in that half of the book. He's just kind of, there is a foil for Meg, you know, he mm-hmm.<affirmative> clearly he's great cuz he sees her for the beautiful person that she is and immediately falls in love with her and is protective of her and like sort of does the like white knight thing and that, I don't know, like that I don't remember that bothering me when I was a kid and I don't even really remember. I thought that Megan, Calvin Romance kind of came later, but it's, it's from like their first encounter interaction where he's just like into her. So it is Yeah. Like how you read it differently as an adult and like Yeah. I'll see those like little like microseconds of like, oh, what this book could have been if she had more time or if she had written it, uh, more thoroughly or more towards an adult type of view. But it's, it's few and far between. Right. But I do think you're right that like reading it as a child is a very different experience cuz that's not, you fill in all the gaps yourself. Yeah. You have that imagination that, that the grownups don't have and you fill in all you content with what you

Speaker 4 29:34

Come

Speaker 2 29:34

Up. Yeah. And it is what it needs to be for you. And it doesn't quite work that way as an adult now.

Speaker 4 29:41

Yeah. But no, that's an interesting point. That's really cool. You're absolutely right.

Speaker 1 29:45

I mean, going back to Calvin, like his, the theme with his mom and then going back to Mrs. Murray, Calvin, um, I mean certainly Calvin's home life is rough. Like that's undeniable. But he makes a point of saying earlier in the book that he really wishes his mother was pretty, like, that seems to be extremely important to him. He seems almost told that up as as as important as his mom is a good mom. Which

Speaker 4 30:15

Maybe there's a,

Speaker 1 30:16

Did not notice that<laugh> when I was a kid. I'm like, these two things are not equivalent.

Speaker 4 30:20

No. Yeah. Maybe it's just, maybe the physical appearance of a mom makes, it's like, gives the illusion of a good mom almost. You know, you have that certain expectation of what a mom, what a mom is supposed to be like mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And on the very least maybe confidence she's like, well she were pretty, she could get away with certain things maybe and maybe she

Speaker 1 30:39

Could,

Speaker 2 30:39

It's the faking it thing, right? Yeah. He can't fake a good family because his mom has no teeth and she looks rough and has had 11 kids. Yeah. And you know, I, if she was pretty,

Speaker 4 30:54

You could mask it

Speaker 2 30:54

Almost, you know, it would be okay, it would fit with this construct that he's made for himself and how he's presenting himself to others and he wouldn't have to hide it as much. Yeah. Like, at least it would be possible if she came to his basketball game versus now, like, there's no way in hell he would want her to come to his basketball game because she's something he's ashamed of and something to hide. Like she doesn't look the part, she looks like what she is to him. Yeah. Which is all negative things, which is a concerning, uh,<laugh>.

Speaker 1 31:25

Yeah.

Speaker 2 31:25

You know, I, I, again, I I'm very confused by what the take home of that is. Like I get it from Calvin's standpoint. I don't know what Madeline Langel is telling us by saying that though. And that's a little bit

Speaker 1 31:39

Ugh. And I also found, although I think Calvin is a much more likable character than Charles Wallace, I sort of see a theme with the boys in the book, even with Calvin of just sort of a take charge sort of assumed. Like even with Calvin Bossiness, like, well of course they're going to be the leaders in this, in this situation. Even when Calvin is, there's that romantic scene where he, he sees her without her glasses in the moonlight and he's like, oh, you have pretty eyes. And, and he's like, I don't want, I don't really want anyone else to see how pretty your eyes are. Like

Speaker 4 32:19

<laugh> Yeah.

Speaker 5 32:21

Romantic. But it's actually like, it's a

Speaker 1 32:23

Obsessiveness Eyes was like, her eyes don't belong to you. Yeah.

Speaker 2 32:27

Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, she's not property.

Speaker 1 32:28

Yeah.

Speaker 4 32:30

Uh, yes, we<laugh>, but

Speaker 1 32:32

It, I did not like, I thought it was sweet as a kid. It's very different to read that now.

Speaker 2 32:38

I was telling Hannah, we used this book when I was a scout leader. We did a, a book club with some of the girls and the moms in the group and we read Wrinkle in Time and we did, when You Reach Me, which is a more current homage to Wrinkle in Time. And I don't remember if that came up at all, but like reading it now. Yeah. I was thinking like, oh, Cora would hate that<laugh>. Like that would've made her so mad even when she was a kid in a way that like, I don't remember thinking Calvin was a jerk, like for saying that. And now I read it and I'm like, Ugh, that's really toxic

Speaker 3 33:15

Masculinity right now.

Speaker 4 33:16

Culture absolutely influenced me. She's

Speaker 2 33:18

Not your property. Neither are her dreamboat eyes, Calvin<laugh> calm down. Like it's not great.

Speaker 1 33:25

So what a weird phrase. Dreamboat dreamboat

Speaker 3 33:27

Eyes.

Speaker 2 33:27

I mean that's gotta be very sixties, right? It's like,

Speaker 4 33:31

Yeah.

Speaker 3 33:31

To be honest, I don't really remember Calvin's character much at all from when I was a kid. I, I don't know what that means. I, I do remember Megan, Charles Wallace and that there was some other third person going with them, but I don't remember the relationship. And when I was reading at this time, seeing, and I was maybe a little more willing to forgive him about the comment about his mother cuz I thought, oh, is this supposed to teach us to build empathy? Like that's not his, his mother isn't his doing, you know, it's um, uh, he shouldn't feel that way. Or but maybe that was a bit generous on on my part to think maybe, maybe she's trying to build some em angle is trying to, to teach empathy<laugh> and uh, and have somebody say, no, Calvin, it's not your fault.

Speaker 4 34:24

<laugh>.

Speaker 2 34:25

Yeah. I mean I do wish that had been a little bit more nuanced. I don't know. I I, I think when I was a kid I really liked the character of Calvin and I think I identified with him on some level where like I really related to the like Yeah, you fake it and you hide certain things because that's how you get along in this world and you keep your specialness to yourself. You know? I mean I feel like that was very much a message of like early childhood school for me.

Speaker 4 34:54

Yeah. I could see little 10 year old is at least actually really resonating with Meg. Not really feeling too connected with other people. I can find solace in Meg and I think maybe a lot of other kids around that age probably feel the same. And so maybe those nuances that we're looking for those, you know, fleshed out ideas. Maybe they didn't matter to us so much when we were younger because we were like, yes, Meg, I feel you. Yeah. Meg. Like, you know, there's that relationship between the reader and the characters that might have been developed easier based on what the kid needed at that point. And

Speaker 1 35:31

I think you brought up really good point. Hey Dalis about how like, middle school being a hard age and Yeah. You see like mes having that awkward mm-hmm.<affirmative> that really hard stage of growing up. She's she's right in the middle of that. Yeah. No pun with middle school intended<laugh>. I love a good pun. But you know, she's like, we see it from the beginning. Like she, you know, she has hair struggles, she has braces. She's like glaring herself in the mirror. Like did you talk

Speaker 4 35:57

About her, her tongue rolling over the

Speaker 1 35:58

Braces? Yeah. Like she, she's she's, she's conscious of it in the whole book. She's like, you know, thinking about her braces the whole time and she's like thinking about her hair, which she, we just did the Endocrin Gables episode. So like, I think it's funny that she has brown hair and she wants like red hair like her mom that's implied some point<laugh>. So everybody wants what they don't have. Exactly. So I mean it's, I think it's, if you read that at the right age, like it's kind, it's very relatable. Yeah. Everybody's like struggling to Yep. Feel comfortable with themselves.

Speaker 3 36:31

Mm-hmm.<affirmative> and her experience in school. I know I'm reading it differently now as an adult than I did as a child who always did the right thing at school and could not understand Meg. And now I read her and she was like my hero<laugh>,

Speaker 1 36:45

But

Speaker 2 36:45

Yeah, she

Speaker 3 36:45

Doesn't feel like doing

Speaker 4 36:47

This. Right.

Speaker 1 36:48

And every teacher too, they were always like, they would say snarky things to her cause she got a, she got an answer wrong and I'm like, really? May, you know, unnecessary.

Speaker 4 36:58

Maybe lingo was tapping into I think her experience. Yeah. Mm-hmm.<affirmative> in, in school if she felt like her teachers were constantly pestering her or calling out her mistakes or anything like that. Maybe that's, you know, her view on teachers and Yeah. She let us know.<laugh>,

Speaker 2 37:14

It's interesting, when we were researching the author, she, she says in multiple interviews that she struggled mightily with math and science. Like she really was on it when it came to the English stuff and, and she understood, you know, language very well and she did well on that front but really, really had a hard time with the math and science. And then to pick a book that hinges so heavily on math and science, at least nominally now. Yeah. I think we should talk about that. Is the physics in the math in the book? Yes. Uh, how how'd that go for everybody?

Speaker 4 37:55

<laugh>? It was during that specific time that I was listening to it. So in the book it has the pictures. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, you know, you have some pictures of the little two-dimensional,

Speaker 2 38:05

Little taact loop with the little

Speaker 4 38:06

Exactly, exactly. I did not have that while I was reading it. And so she's explaining these dimensions, but just like everything else, I feel like it was slightly touched on not exactly delved into

Speaker 2 38:18

Yeah.

Speaker 4 38:19

Because that's a hole<laugh>,

Speaker 1 38:20

It's shallow. Yeah.

Speaker 4 38:22

It's,

Speaker 2 38:22

It's a very superficial sort of understanding. But I

Speaker 1 38:25

Also,

Speaker 4 38:26

Yeah. I don't know if we could have expanded it, but she could have expanded it a bit more without confusing the children or whoever the readers are. It's kinda like, yeah, I grasp what you were saying, but it still doesn't make sense. Just a little bit.

Speaker 2 38:40

Just a little bit. Yeah. I think Hannah's gonna discuss the book with a physicist too, I'm sure is going to have a lot, lot of, um, much more substantive information for us. But I, I'm assuming most of it is pretty superficial cuz I got very irritated at the point where she's trying to fight things and you know, Calvin said the Declaration of Independence or the Gettysburg Address or something to like fight off the, like mind control because he engaged so completely with the words of that, that it was very meaningful and kept him in himself. And mega had tried to start something but like, she's not good with words. So then she's like, no, I gotta go to something that is more everybody knows me and her dad has her like trying to the period

Speaker 1 39:22

Table

Speaker 2 39:22

Do square roots of things too. And that bothered me because they make it sound like she's mental mouthing her way to the square root of numbers like five. You can't do that. There's nothing but memorization for numbers like that because there's not a cheat to mental math A square. Yeah. That's not a perfect square. So that was very, for me it was like, oh, now I can, I can see the, like she likes the ideas of math, but math is not really math one lingual strength because you wouldn't write it this way if math was your strength. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. So then I thought that probably is true of the physics as well. But

Speaker 1 39:57

Yeah, I will, I'll have, we'll talk later, we'll have a section later on where we'll talk with the physicist. We'll see, have some more thought about that. But I think that, um, I think you can see that the book is filled with pretty, fairly a lot deeper as Farge references go. Literary illusions, mythological folklore. I think you can see the fact that she, she's the very well-read person and I would kind of love to know some of the books she read, like we know that she read, we know that she read like, for example, LM Montgomery books cuz we read that in the afterward. We were talking about that before you recorded the episode. But I fore one, I would love to know if she read Tolkin because a lot of the way, and I know that maybe this is a way we can jump into the discussion on what genre this book is cuz I think it's not clear. But I, I think a lot of the tropes in this remind me of kind of classic high fantasy. And I think a lot of, I I, this reminds me a a lot about the, the lord of the Ring series. Like, not, not even the Hobbit, but specifically of the Lord of the Rings.

Speaker 2 41:08

I mean it's like classic mythological stuff, right? Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, we have our hero's journey with Meg and we get, like, her Achilles heel ends up being her strength actually. And not to offend anybody potentially, but I, I do think it's interesting for a book that is pretty overtly religious at many points, she does seem to be taking a much more, I guess, broad humanistic view of religion. So it seems to me that her overarching thing is all of these things are part of religious experience because they're part of what it means to be human. So Meg's hero's journey is not that different from Jesus' path in the Bible. The science of a tesser act is all part and parcel of the wonder of the world, which is interesting and I think probably quite progressive for the time. You know, certainly she's, she's taking a much broader view of science as all being under the umbrella or all fitting nicely under the umbrella of Christianity than I think most Christians even now would probably take it as there's a lot of things that don't fit with a, a more narrow biblical view of Christianity. So that's interesting to me. And I think it's also part of why she's able to get so like blurry and gray on the science because like to her it's, well the nuts and bolts don't really matter. Like god's everything. So anything can fit. You know, I think it, it certainly fits in the fantasy realm. I I think it certainly fits in sci-fi. You know, I, I think some of the things that when you read it that have sort of obvious similarities to it are Narnia. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, I think, uh, the Orson Scott card

Speaker 4 43:06

Books Anders Game

Speaker 2 43:07

Definitely are very similar in many ways.

Speaker 4 43:11

I loved Enders Game in middle school, loved it. Read it again as an adult. I was like, whew, what, where was yep. What was my mental state

Speaker 2 43:20

<laugh> Exactly. Like, that was another one that I read when I was young. And then as an adult it's like, whoa, this is real religious. Like,

Speaker 4 43:26

And that's crazy cuz I loved it. And the whole gifted children Oh yeah. Uh, you know, yeah. Focused.

Speaker 2 43:32

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. I don't know, I just took us down a rabbit hole with that, but yeah. I don't know what genre with you. I

Speaker 3 43:38

<laugh> I guess. Yeah. I, I I think that I would, now that you're pro putting it what either science fiction or fantasy, I think originally I would've said fantasy, even with the tesseract, even though it's people like us on our planet, but it, it, uh, going to other worlds that may exist. I, yeah, I,

Speaker 2 44:03

The Star Trek comparison is really relevant to me here too though, because I think most people consider Star Trek to be sci-fi mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. But the science in Star Trek is also just rubbish and doesn't hold up at all. And it really is also much more not on<laugh>, sort of the hero's journey and, and humanism and so, so I don't know. I mean, I feel like you could call this either,

Speaker 4 44:31

I feel like it's genre bending, but<laugh>, one of the, one of the abilities of genre bending is that if she were to have stuck to one specific genre, there's almost like parameters that you have to check off like a rubric for it to be considered sci-fi. Let's say if she, you know, um, published it under a sci-fi tag or a fantasy tag. There's almost like those communities, they have a specific way of categorizing, but since she didn't do that, it's almost a few different genres across the board. It's easier for her to get away with

Speaker 2 45:03

Things. Well, so is this maybe one of the first children's dystopian literature works?

Speaker 4 45:10

I,

Speaker 2 45:11

Because to me it has a lot more in common with something like 1984 or Animal Farm in a lot of ways. And they certainly present a dystopian reality on Chaat.

Speaker 4 45:23

Yeah. The, the synchronous ball bouncing.

Speaker 2 45:27

And that's often a very like, blurry genre itself. Like yeah, there's a little bit of science in there, there's fantasy and there's,

Speaker 4 45:34

They throwing heavy government

Speaker 2 45:35

<laugh>. Maybe it fits a little neat neater into dystopian fiction.

Speaker 1 45:39

It feels different than dys than Disto than I'm, I'm just trying to think of the classic dys dystopian works. It, it feels different to me and I'm trying to think of why. And maybe, maybe I'm maybe arm arguing myself into a corner and, and, and there's no difference.

Speaker 3 45:54

But I do know what you mean because when I was a child, Hannah, this was like, as I, they<laugh> and then I went back and it was just like all over like that somehow everybody's fine. But what happened? And I,

Speaker 2 46:09

Yeah, I mean it's less dystopian because there's no like lingering trauma at the end of the book mostly cuz they sew it up in one page. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, but

Speaker 4 46:18

There's

Speaker 2 46:19

No change to the condition of the universe. Nothing. Which feels very dystopian to me. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. It's like

Speaker 4 46:27

The effort's

Speaker 2 46:28

Kind of, okay, well you're still alive live to fight another day. Good luck with that.

Speaker 4 46:35

You know, there's always tomorrow<laugh>. I don't, yeah, I think she just got her dad back home.

Speaker 3 46:41

I, I don't even think I, I just kind of read it as this and I don't think Langel was thinking about that. To me it almost seemed like a naive hippy-dippy, maybe not faith love is all you love. Yeah. Loves of love and that's, that's the faith that you're talking about. But I'm more inclusive of any religion or this is sounding very cynical. I I did not hate the book<laugh>, but, but it just seems like the simplistic, but not nothing resolved, hippie dippy love is all you need. Uh,

Speaker 4 47:19

Kind of sounds like when I'm on a,

Speaker 3 47:21

Going through

Speaker 4 47:22

Like an ADHD tangent and I think at one point I'm like, yes. And I start the story and I ended up like 10 miles down the road and I don't remember how to get back to that first point. Yeah. But at least I made it to the end of the other point. So that, that's almost what it, like that disjointed feeling.

Speaker 2 47:38

I totally get that like a, again, it it's just the message doesn't land for me. Yeah. Because I don't know what the message really is. There's lots of potential messages sprinkled in mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Yes. But I don't argue how well any of them actually land because they sometimes contradict the each other and sometimes they don't really seem to go anywhere. They just start and Yeah, it, it is, it feels very tangential at points where then it's like not following you anymore. Yep. I, I I don't know where you went with that one. Yes.

Speaker 1 48:09

Like, I mean, well I'm looking at my copy of a Wrinkled Time has a genre sticker that has a spaceship. It says science fiction, which obviously is an authoritative way to learn the genre. I mean, I, you know, being serious per sec, I don't think you have to have spaceships for something to be science fiction. Yeah. So I think this is the genre Blendy book.

Speaker 2 48:35

I think we've hit most of the things on the discussion topics. But Hannah, you brought up, uh, I think it was you saying some of the things that Madeline Lingle had read. We have at least some guide, well I assume some guide, unless she just got like one of the big quotation books. But<laugh> from all of the quotes from Mrs. Who mm-hmm.<affirmative>, I would assume these are quotes that were meaningful to Madeline Lingle when she read them, and that's why they've made it into the book. And we have certainly some stuff in Greek. We've got Shakespeare, we have, um, a bit from the Tempest in it. We've got, uh, Greta I think at one point as well, it's interesting to have a character who speaks almost entirely in quotations from other literary work. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, I don't know how well it works here, but the idea of it is interesting and it, you know, I kind of get why this works for a kid. It feels very weighty. It's like, Ooh, look, this is in another language. Ooh, look, it came from a really famous important book. And like, feeling like that elevates this beyond like kids' literature at some sense. But then reading it as an adult, it feels very superficial because you're not actually getting anything out of those quotes with zero context for them. Like just reading the Tempest Bit again about being imprisoned in the Cloven Pine, it's like, if you haven't read The Tempest, that section means nothing. It's

Speaker 1 50:03

A, which is, I haven't, it's, and it didn't<laugh>. It's like<laugh>.

Speaker 2 50:07

Yeah. It's, it's a very odd device to use in a children's book, but it's all over the place in there because it's pretty much the only way that Ms. Sue functions because they say she doesn't have a good capacity for language of her own. She has a hard time framing her own thoughts, I guess into words. I did wanna just kind of generally talk about that because Calvin is supposed to be very gifted at communicating. He's better at words, but he also has this like, at least somewhat telepathic ability like Charles Wallace does. Meg is bad at words we're told, and she doesn't have that ability. And then we have quoting Mrs. Who I, I, again, this is another like, what are we supposed to make of this? Are we supposed to come away thinking the words are more important than the science? Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, or that the science is more important than the words. I feel like there is a judgment somewhere in there from the author. I just don't know what it is.

Speaker 4 51:06

I don't know. Like

Speaker 2 51:07

That she, it's confusing sprinkles, the whole book with quotes seems like she's making an argument in favor of words being what really matters and the end. Yeah. But then Meg is the heroine and she's bad at words. So it's like, no, it's just love. It's just love.

Speaker 4 51:24

Maybe that is the selling point.

Speaker 3 51:26

You gave her more consideration than I did because I was so frustrated. It was just like, no, she's just this, this<laugh>, this is just a feelings letting my feelings be known book. And I'm going to just make an interesting story and put some stuff in it. I, but I, I think my, my reading though was very similar<laugh> in that way. I was just a little more, well less generous I guess,

Speaker 4 51:52

Of all the quotes that Mrs. Who quoted, I think the last one, the last one that she was towards the end of the book. And it was the last thing she said to Meg before Meg went to go save Charles Wallace. And it had something to do with God and love. And I felt like the author like Lingo was culminating this big event between all those quotes. And then this is the last quote, and this is the quote that mattered like,

Speaker 2 52:19

Hmm. Oh yeah, yeah. The foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men. Before you see your calling brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. And God has 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 half God chosen, yay. And things which are not to bring, to not things that are,

Speaker 3 52:52

I don't right

Speaker 4 52:53

<laugh>,

Speaker 3 52:54

It's, uh, it brings to mind those I probably shouldn't go there, but like those, the Well, it's, it's, God, you don't need to investigate any further. I, yeah. You can't know

Speaker 2 53:07

God's should planned, but this, this is his his plan. So go matter.

Speaker 3 53:10

Stop questioning.

Speaker 4 53:11

No, I think that was definitely the culture. Absolutely. That was, I think the general societal thought when it came to religion, at least in the United States, because I, like I said like my, my background, these, like, these arguments literally sound like what they tell you sometimes in, um, church environments. It's, you don't question God. You don't put a question mark where God put a period kind of situation. There is the power dynamic between God and people. And there's usually this connotation that people are imperfect that only God is perfect. So if God can create maybe these group of people that are looked down upon, that doesn't mean they're not important. You know, there's a natural way of things going. At least that's what I got from that little segment. But then again, just like everything else, I was like, wait, what<laugh>, what was it, what was the, the, the, the reason<laugh>, what was the reason? I don't know.

Speaker 2 54:10

Yeah. And again, for it to end that way is l I don't know. That to me again, puts it back into dystopian land because this doesn't feel much like a choice for Mag. She doesn't wanna go. She doesn't, first off to, she

Speaker 4 54:26

Was like, she wanted her dad to

Speaker 2 54:27

Fix it. Like, I'm not gonna do this. She's sobbing. Yeah. She

Speaker 4 54:32

Was

Speaker 2 54:32

Really upset. And they're just kind of like, well, you have to wanna go, but okay, she doesn't, doesn't, and so you're telling her she has to, but she has to wanna do it. And she's like, okay, fine. I guess I'll go because this is bigger than me. That still feels very bleak in a, you're just a pawn in the machinations of mm-hmm.<affirmative>, whatever this fight is between the good thing and the dark thing that have existed since long before anyone was a twinkle in the eye of the universe. You're just a pawn in that. That's dark.

Speaker 4 55:09

That is right.

Speaker 2 55:10

That's real bleak. I mean, I, I get that. That's in keeping with a Christian worldview in some ways it is. Yeah. But this is it, it is a very like robbed of choice sort of mm-hmm.<affirmative> thing to leave her with.

Speaker 1 55:23

And just to throw another reference in here to make it more convoluted, I know, I know you've seen this show, Heather, but has anyone else seen Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

Speaker 4 55:34

No, but I had to write a paper on it.<laugh>.

Speaker 2 55:37

I was a fire fly fan. Yeah.

Speaker 4 55:40

It was like a, a writing seminar, a vampire series, like It was very interesting. Uh,

Speaker 1 55:45

That does sound interesting. Doesn't

Speaker 4 55:47

<laugh>

Speaker 1 55:48

Well, I'll barrel forward with the reference anyway, and, and hopefully, uh, yeah, it will, it will. You'll we all come with me. Um, so in season one, hopefully I'm not spoiling anyone's,

Speaker 2 56:00

It's like a 20 year old show. I think it's okay. Spoiler this.

Speaker 4 56:03

We haven't watched the,

Speaker 2 56:05

We'd already get a spoiler loose spoilers for Buffy, if anyone Hasn hasn't seen it yet. Fast

Speaker 1 56:09

Forward. So, um, there's a prophecy that Buffy, hes to fight the master. This really ancient vampire with this Buffy calls it gross brute punch mouth. Um, and she, she walks into the room and overhears some people saying that, you know, her watcher an angel, I believe, saying that she's going to die at the hands of this vampire. And she is 16. And she very, and she has this reaction of, well, screw this. I don't want to die. Um, I quit. And uh, you know, she, she, there's this very like moving theme where, you know, Sarah Michelle Geller, like very realistically act that this child who does not want to be killed. And I, I kept thinking about that scene when Meg is, um, being told she has to go back alone to Kaza to rescue her baby brother. And there's all these adults and powerful beings. They

Speaker 4 57:07

Said they couldn't take her, can't

Speaker 1 57:09

Do anything

Speaker 2 57:09

To help her. It's Harry Potter's trip into the woods. It's when he realizes that Dumbledore has raised him for slaughter, essentially. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, he still does it. But he has that crisis of faith where it's like, wait, all of these people that had so much more power than me and were in so much better shape than me to do this, did nothing. And there's a disappointment and a hurt with that. And I do think that that comes through from Megan, this with she, she is very disappointed and upset with the Mrs. Ws for not intervening, but then at the end intervened. They could have

Speaker 4 57:46

Intervened. They did. They were like, we'll drop you off. Fine. Yeah.

Speaker 2 57:48

What? We'll, just, I thought you guys couldn't go here, slide in, pick up you and Charles Wallace now that you why did got him to Zombie? And we said we couldn't do that, but actually we could. We just had to see if, if you were gonna want do this on your own. Like

Speaker 4 58:03

It didn't, it didn't

Speaker 2 58:04

Very much like, it's a very mixed message in this.

Speaker 4 58:07

Why is it always kids<laugh>? I don't know why. I think maybe they're impressionable, but really when you think about it, like Buffy being 16 years old, I don't remember how old Meg is. She's younger. She's younger.

Speaker 2 58:22

She's 13 and

Speaker 4 58:24

13. 13. And being, you know, faced with death essentially. Like if you don't do this with that, it's really gonna happen to all of us. And like they're imposing this great consequence on this child and you can tell she's very upset and they're like, calm down. Yeah. Like, you need to breathe and then you need to go. So either accept it or accept it. Really. Like there's only one way. There's only one option. So it's not really a choice. It's not really an option. Yeah.

Speaker 2 58:55

I do think Buffy is less explicitly Christian than any of these worldviews because Yeah. Buffy stays angry at the power structure and like, I don't know that we are meant to believe at any point that like yeah, it's okay that they do this to these girls.

Speaker 1 59:11

Yeah. The only thing way the, it's really Christian is that the crew fixes work to burn Vampire. Sorry.

Speaker 2 59:17

Yeah.<laugh>. That's ok. But like this very much fits with the sort of chosen one narrative. Mm-hmm.<affirmative> and some of the other books that we've mentioned where the message really does seem to be, it's not for you to understand. This is just Right and it's the design of things that this needed to happen. And that's,

Speaker 3 59:40

But, and, and Meg does come to an understanding I suppose, which may be like, oh, it has to be me. Cuz I'm the one who loves and knows my brother<laugh>. But again, going back to the love can save him. You're the one. But, but yes. I that, that's, I take your point. Perfect. That exactly they're chosen one. It has to be you even though we could help

Speaker 6 1:00:05

But we don't love him as much.

Speaker 2 1:00:08

<laugh>. Well, like he didn't know his dad, I guess was there

Speaker 3 1:00:11

Was that lack of connection.

Speaker 2 1:00:12

So he didn't have that connection to his dad, even if his dad felt that to him. Yeah. But yeah,

Speaker 3 1:00:22

Each episode we are heading into the library and talking to you, well not you, but people like you right here in the stacks today. We wanna know what is your favorite movie based on a book?

Speaker 7 1:00:36

Most of them are horrible. My issue with movies out of books is I have to read the book before I watch the movie. And if it's a series I have to read the entire series before I watch them

Speaker 8 1:00:45

Have any of them. Good. No nice rings.

Speaker 7 1:00:52

Alright. Lord. The rings of Harry Potter are the only two. It's two outta how many Yeah.

Speaker 6 1:00:56

World. What was a good movie? I've read the book and the book was really good. And so was the movie I like, I like the dinosaurs.

Speaker 9 1:01:08

Oh, I preferred the Titanic. The movie was good.<laugh>, the movie was good, but the book was me. It was, it was okay. I just preferred the movie better. You

Speaker 8 1:01:18

Got one for me.

Speaker 10 1:01:18

The book I, I I prefered the book for the Wrinkle in Time because the movie

Speaker 2 1:01:23

Got the book we did for this episode.

Speaker 9 1:01:25

Oh,

Speaker 10 1:01:26

The movie was super duper cringe. The the last episode, like the last part. She was like, um, I loved you Charles Wallace. Uh, yeah. And then she kept on saying it and I didn't, uh, I didn't understand

Speaker 6 1:01:39

I have the same opinion as him, but there's also another book in that series and Disney's coming out with another movie, so I'm thinking maybe it'll be better and they'll learn from everybody telling them that their movie sucks.

Speaker 11 1:01:50

That's a very good question. Um, I like Harry Potter. Um, my, um, dad also really likes films, so ever since I was born and he's probably feeding me while watching the Marvel movie. Um, so that was probably implanted in me, but I think the book was very good. But I like I learned by like seeing, but I think it was in, um, uh, interpreted very well

Speaker 1 1:02:26

For our game segment. We're going to take a quiz and we're going to each take it as us and see which, uh, wrinkle and time character we come out as. All right, so let's click on the link. All right. The first question is, uh, choose a Scientist. We have a picture of Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Katherine Johnson, Isaac Newton, Sally Ride, and Neil Degrass Tyson,

Speaker 3 1:02:52

What is the question? Choose a scientist. Okay.

Speaker 2 1:02:57

I guess I'll go with Sally Ride. She seemed approachable and like, I feel like the other people here are probably out of my lead, but I could ride on a spaceship<laugh>

Speaker 1 1:03:07

I with Sally Ride

Speaker 2 1:03:09

Too. Would I'm the end into that? Yeah.

Speaker 3 1:03:10

What is, what are we supposed to be basing our choices? Do

Speaker 2 1:03:13

You, who do you like best or who is most like you? Maybe?

Speaker 1 1:03:18

Oh,

Speaker 3 1:03:19

Hey,

Speaker 2 1:03:20

Do you went with Catherine Johnson? Yes,

Speaker 1 1:03:21

I did.

Speaker 3 1:03:22

I went with Einstein because I like a lot of his quotes.<laugh>.

Speaker 1 1:03:28

All right, next question is you. The time machine choices are Time Turner, the Tardis, the DeLorean and the hot tub<laugh>. I know my mom would definitely say DeLorean.<laugh>

Speaker 3 1:03:41

<laugh>.

Speaker 2 1:03:43

I'll go with the time turner.

Speaker 1 1:03:45

I'd go with the Tardis.

Speaker 3 1:03:46

I went with the Tardis too.

Speaker 1 1:03:47

Classic

Speaker 3 1:03:49

After, after Dolly said that about her mother. She, my mom has been very, very fun

Speaker 1 1:03:53

And cool and she has great taste.

Speaker 3 1:03:56

<laugh>, so if you wouldn't line with that, you also are very fun. We have a great taste. Yes, yes. No, no, no, no. I need, I know I'm older than your mother. Anyway, so it's Sean. She likes the car.<laugh>

Speaker 1 1:04:09

Chooses a photo of the sky. Uh, we have a photo of a blue sky with white fluffy clouds. Um, we have a, looks like, uh, the black of space with the star sprinkled craw it uh, we have what looks like either a sunset or a sunrise and we have uh, it looks like space, but there's some blueish

Speaker 2 1:04:32

Nebula.

Speaker 3 1:04:33

<laugh>, yeah,

Speaker 1 1:04:34

Something

Speaker 2 1:04:36

<laugh>.

Speaker 1 1:04:36

Um, and then we have I guess another nebula, but it's kind of rainbow ish. And then we have uh, what looks like stormy clouds For the last picture I did the colorful one.

Speaker 2 1:04:47

<laugh>. You did the rainbow. Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:04:48

Yeah. That's a pretty one. I don't know which one I wanted to choose. I'm gonna go with the storm clubs.

Speaker 3 1:04:56

I went with the, the storm clouds, the nebula that you, the first one you said

Speaker 1 1:04:59

The bluish

Speaker 3 1:05:00

One. I don't know. Looking up to any of those. The sky always very soothing for me. Yeah, it's very, it doesn't matter. It's all<laugh>.

Speaker 2 1:05:09

I, I'll go with the same one as Deborah.

Speaker 1 1:05:14

Choose a wrinkle in time quote. Wild lights are my glory.<laugh>. Have you ever tried to get to your feet with a sprained dignity experiment as the mother of knowledge like and equal are not the same thing at all. People are more than just the way they look and believing takes practice.

Speaker 4 1:05:36

I think in the book it actually says, I think it's like a Spanish quote and they said experiences. The mother of knowledge.

Speaker 1 1:05:41

Yeah. Interesting. They, yeah, they put it kind of wish they had kept it in the original right language.

Speaker 4 1:05:48

I'm gonna go with it anyways cuz we know which one we're talking<laugh>.

Speaker 3 1:05:51

Yeah.

Speaker 4 1:05:52

Um, I did remember when I read the Sprain Dignity Line, I kind of liked that.

Speaker 1 1:05:56

It was funny. It

Speaker 4 1:05:56

Was like, ah, yes,

Speaker 1 1:05:58

<laugh>, I'm gonna go with wild nights for my glory.

Speaker 3 1:06:00

So am I. Even though it is not me at all. I love it. You love

Speaker 4 1:06:04

Lion. You love

Speaker 3 1:06:05

Lion. Wild nights are her glory. But<laugh>,

Speaker 4 1:06:09

It's a crazy night.

Speaker 2 1:06:10

I love it. I think I'll go with that one too. Deborah and I are gonna with the same result.

Speaker 1 1:06:16

<laugh>, when you think of space, you feel overwhelmed, scared, curious, excited. Small. To be honest, I don't think about it.

Speaker 3 1:06:30

I'm going with small, but it's not, that's like comforting to me.

Speaker 2 1:06:34

<laugh>. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>.

Speaker 3 1:06:35

So it's not a pejorative. Small

Speaker 4 1:06:39

Overwhelm but not overwhelm can easily de like lead into like an anxious rabbit hole over me.

Speaker 1 1:06:46

I'm gonna go with overwhelm. Just because when you think about mm-hmm.<affirmative>, the size of space for long enough, you get dizzy. Yes.

Speaker 4 1:06:54

That's, yes. I don't know if you guys saw that NASA came out last year with a picture of, I think it was a picture of a hundred galaxies and it has, you know, the red arrow, you are here. Mm-hmm.<affirmative> and then all these other ones. I'm like, um, I'm bananas. Four 11<laugh>.

Speaker 3 1:07:10

I cannot

Speaker 4 1:07:10

Imagine like that's craziness.

Speaker 2 1:07:15

I guess I'll go with curious. I'm between that and excited. I really like space. Yeah. I like the vastness of it and the unknowability of things in my lifetime. But

Speaker 4 1:07:26

Yeah,

Speaker 1 1:07:28

Choose a space movie. Wally Aliens et Star Wars. The Last Jedi Guardians of the Galaxy.

Speaker 4 1:07:40

Amazing soundtrack.

Speaker 1 1:07:42

Yes. Uhhuh<laugh>. 2001 is Space Odyssey. Close Encounters of the Third Kind Men in Black Apollo 13.

Speaker 3 1:07:52

I went with Wally.

Speaker 4 1:07:55

Wally.

Speaker 1 1:07:55

He's a cute little robot.

Speaker 2 1:07:57

I'll go with men in black I guess.

Speaker 1 1:07:59

Nice.

Speaker 2 1:08:00

I got Mrs. What it, what did you get?

Speaker 3 1:08:04

I'm the annoying<laugh>. You're annoyance. Charles Wally. Oh, you got Charles. I got a cheek. Oh

Speaker 1 1:08:12

My goodness. No, I'm not, I'm choosing.

Speaker 2 1:08:15

Okay. What did your, what does your uh, blurb say about Charles Wallace

Speaker 3 1:08:19

<laugh>? I

Speaker 2 1:08:20

Doubt it says he is annoying.

Speaker 3 1:08:22

He does that. Yeah.

Speaker 4 1:08:23

It says you stand out in a crowd, but in the best way possible.<laugh>, you take pride in being one of a kind and showcase a thing that makes you unique. You count on friends and family to keep you grounded and always look to them when you need advice.<laugh>

Speaker 2 1:08:37

Is that wrong,

Speaker 3 1:08:39

<laugh>? I know that is about as far away from me as you can

Speaker 4 1:08:42

Get. I think I'm just gonna put it out there. Buzzfeed, you let me down.<laugh>.

Speaker 2 1:08:46

Yeah. Maybe we should have written our own for this one. I feel like this is, this

Speaker 4 1:08:49

Is

Speaker 2 1:08:50

Interesting though. Kind of a fail for me too. Mrs. Whatsit, you are a very outgoing and spontaneous person. People are attracted to your contagious energy and you make friends wherever you go though. Parties usually don't start until you get there. You're extremely compassionate and wouldn't have any problem taking the night off from fun to care for a sick friend or be someone's shoulder to cry on. Yeah. That's not a great<laugh> match, but apparently I'm Reese Witherspoon in the movie, so release that to the picture

Speaker 4 1:09:20

Is can't say another kid's name. I'm

Speaker 1 1:09:22

Also Mrs. Watson. It

Speaker 4 1:09:23

That's interesting cuz I, from what I heard, must never, we didn't, we didn't pick the same things. No.

Speaker 2 1:09:29

Besides Wally, I think we overlap more than w

Speaker 1 1:09:33

<laugh>. We should

Speaker 2 1:09:34

Write the mysteries of a Buzzfeed quiz.

Speaker 1 1:09:36

We should write and then ask about their methodology.

Speaker 2 1:09:38

Yeah.

Speaker 4 1:09:39

I need to speak to the manager.<laugh> immediate, the

Speaker 1 1:09:44

Manager of Buzzfeed.

Speaker 4 1:09:45

Yes. You are speaking to the manager. Each episode we ask whether our book passes the Bechtel test. The Betel test asks whether a work features two female characters who talk to each other about something that doesn't involve men or boys. Does it pass?

Speaker 2 1:10:03

No. No. I don't think it does at all.

Speaker 4 1:10:05

I don't think so. Everywhere I looked said that it did.

Speaker 1 1:10:09

Does she talk to her mom? Any point about

Speaker 2 1:10:12

Anything?

Speaker 4 1:10:13

Oh, she talks to her mom about her dad. There was one, let me

Speaker 2 1:10:16

Bring it up the sandwich. I guess like I don't think that

Speaker 3 1:10:20

Count. Yeah, that and how she's doesn't like being different, but I don't know. It says that doesn't have any friends to talk to<laugh>.

Speaker 4 1:10:28

It says that the conversation where she talks about one of them gives the gift of her faults to Meg. They said that that might have been a conversation, but

Speaker 2 1:10:38

That's still with the whole point of going to save her dad. Yeah. I don't, I don't think you can remove that context for me.

Speaker 3 1:10:45

It's not really a, it's not a another female. I guess she's presenting a unknowable beings.

Speaker 2 1:10:51

Its currently form

Speaker 4 1:10:55

And

Speaker 1 1:10:55

When she's talking to her mom, she's talking about the boy that she fought<laugh>.

Speaker 4 1:11:00

Yeah. I really didn't.

Speaker 2 1:11:02

I mean the only thing where I think it gets close is maybe when she and Aunt Beast are talking about like sight and lack of sight and vision and like what is light and what is dark. Yeah. That's the, but that only works if you consider Aunt Beast to actually be a woman. And I, I, I'm not clear that that that

Speaker 4 1:11:26

If it's not clear, then I wouldn't count it

Speaker 2 1:11:28

Type of being is gendered

Speaker 1 1:11:30

Actually. I feel like they settle on aunt because it's sort of a nurturing,

Speaker 2 1:11:35

It was better than mother or father they said, which makes me think that the gender is non-important there. It's just, is

Speaker 4 1:11:41

It weird that they only met for 20 minutes and that she loved her? I don't know.<laugh>, I

Speaker 2 1:11:44

Really want like an Aunt Beast, like squishmellow or something. They seemed so soft and like I just wanted, that's like

Speaker 4 1:11:52

Squish cuddling with my cat. Yeah,<laugh>.

Speaker 1 1:11:56

The, the beasts were, were very sweet. They're

Speaker 4 1:11:58

Very nice, very nice beasts.

Speaker 2 1:12:00

This is a disappointing fail for, but I think it fails.

Speaker 1 1:12:04

I think it does.

Speaker 4 1:12:05

Yeah. Because even the overarching plot was to save her dad.

Speaker 2 1:12:11

So the conversation and then to save

Speaker 4 1:12:12

And then to save her brother. So yeah, it always related to those two things essentially

Speaker 1 1:12:17

Well. That's it for this episode of These Books Made Me join us next time when we'll discuss a book in which somebody holds a mock trial. If you think you know which book we're tackling next, drop us a tweet. We're@ pgcmls on Twitter and#TheseBooksMadeMe. You can also send us your questions at these books made me@pgccmls.info for historical deep dives in read likes. Check out our blog, which is linked in the episode notes.