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| Cover of Tina's homemade note to me. |
I am writing this post about a month after I actually finished the book (but I'm dating the post closer to when I think I completed the book). The Covid chaos (to simplify the accumulation of distractions, frustrations, and anxieties) has resulted in diminished motivation for things like logging my activities, filing receipts and anything that is not needed for basic living.
Anyone who has read Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time will recognize my reference in the title of this blog post. I wrote about the background to my reason for reading this book in a previous post. After wracking my brain trying to recall when I finished the book, I thought the book title to be a most appropriate title for the blog post.
My sister, Tina, sent me a note (see picture above) in answer to my inquiry on why she sent me the book. I thought the note was pretty cool, and a good way to start the post.
Bottom line: I finished the book, enjoyed it immensely, and heartily recommend it.
(Apparently Disney produced a movie version a few years ago but I have no interest in that). I just finished the Durant's book (see below) and I'm anxious to post about it but don't want to let my thoughts about A Wrinkle in Time slip away.
There is a lot I could say about this book but I don't want to write a dissertation here. If you are keen to discuss the book, call me and let's talk.
The book is beautifully summed up in 90 seconds in this video:
As you may know, while I was reading AWIT, I was also plowing through Will and Ariel Durant's The Story of Civilization (Part VIII) The Age of Louis XIV. During the various narratives about time travel in AWIT, I was also reading about Newton and Leibniz developing the Calculus, Physics and Science and Astronomy (Halley's comet) and philosophy (John Locke, George Berkeley, Spinoza). So there was a lot of philosophical and astronomical overlap between the two books.
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| The Black Cloud (1957 US edition). |
Later, in some of my supplemental reading about AWIT, I learned that Madeleine L'Engle was reading about Einstein as well as the astronomer and science fiction author Fred Hoyle. It appears that his novel, The Black Cloud, influenced "The Dark Thing" in AWIT.
Overall, I enjoyed the book but was disappointed in the ending: "All You Need is Love" which I found to be contrived and convenient (need to find an ending, quick. "Love" is always a nice solution). But what exactly is love? It's more that the main character Meg running around IT shouting, "I love you." This was simple and silly because it seemed to come out of nowhere, like clicking your heels ans chanting "there's no place like home."
This book turned into The Time Quintet series and four (4) more books were published during the next thirty years. I don't know if I will read those. Perhaps I might if someone gives them to me as a gift or I find them cheap at a used book sale.
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Links:
http://ricketwrite.blogspot.com/2021/02/tomorrow-never-knows.html
https://www.madeleinelengle.com/
https://read.macmillan.com/mcpg/a-wrinkle-in-time/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhsCCQrCNAs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hoyle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Black_Cloud
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_Quintet
https://vimeo.com/222978679
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Written Sunday 18 April 2021.
