Literature Unit Study Guide:
A Wrinkle In Time by Madeline L'Engle
The author
• Look up a biography of Ms. L'Engle's life.
Characters
•Meg is 14 years old and having a hard time with school and the people in her life. Is this just a "teen thing" or is it because of her family situation and the fact that her father is missing?
•Calvin is about 16 years old, and comes from a large family that is not well-behaved nor well taken care of. Describe how Calvin gets along with his family and with other people despite a bad home life. Compare and contrast this with Meg's dealings with her family and other people even though she has a very loving family.
•Charles Wallace is only 5 years old, but is a child genius. How else is Charles different from other people? Charles seems to have a fairly balanced view of himself, but what fault gets him into trouble?
•The Mrs. W's: who are they, and where do they come from? What is different about each one of them, and how are they alike? Why does Mrs. Who always speak in quotations, and is this an effective way to communicate or not? Do you think they are "messengers from God" as Calvin describes them to the people of Ixchel?
•"IT" is the embodiment of the evil that has taken over on Camazotz. How is IT described in the book? IT describes itself as the "Happiest Sadist", and while this is intended as a play on words, is that actually a good way to describe IT?
Settings
•The book starts out on Earth, and partway through, the children discover that Earth is partly shadowed by the "Black Thing" which is causing evil and suffering on Earth. Is that really what causes bad things to happen here?
•The children's first stop is a planet called Uriel. Describe the beauty of the planet and the creatures that live there. Try drawing the creatures of Uriel as you imagine them.
•What is Camazotz like? Why do you think they gave in to the Black Thing? Why do you think the Black Thing and IT cause all the people to be exactly alike? Does conformity make life easier?
•What do you think Ixchel and its inhabitants look like?
Religion, myth and mysticism
•Some people categorize this book as a "Christian fantasy" book. Is this a fair assessment? What makes people see it that way?
•Other people say this book is against Christian beliefs. What makes them say that? Are they right?
•What is "evil"? Is it a dark, widespread force as depicted in the book, or is it something else? What are some of the characteristics of evil?
•In the Happy Medium's cave, a list of people who have fought against the evil of the Black Thing shadowing Earth is given. Is this a good list or not? Jesus is the first name on the list; is it right to put Him in the same list as human artists, writers and political activists?
Science and math
•Tesseracts are real mathematical constructs. Study about tesseracts and see if you can understand what a tesseract really is. Can it be used for space and time travel like in the book? How would traveling this way feel?
•Ms. L'Engle's definition of a tesseract in the book is different than the true mathematical definition. What is different about her explanation?
•Look at some of the models of tesseracts, and see if you can build one of the models yourself.
•Charles Wallace is shown to have a limited form of telepathic communication with Meg and his mother. Can people really do this?
Concepts
•Discuss the concept presented in the book that "like and equal are not the same thing". Is it possible for everyone to be equal with being exactly alike?
•The people of Camazotz are as perfectly alike as it is possible to make them. Is this possible? What about conformity can be nice? What about it can be bad? Would you be willing to give in to perfect conformity so that you never had to make your own decisions again? Why or why not?
•The people of Camazotz are also not allowed to "suffer" with illness or deformity, but instead are "put to sleep", or rather, killed. Has this ever happened in human history, and what have people done about this situation?
•The inhabitants of Ixchel do not have eyes, so describing people or things to them in visual ways is useless. They ask Meg to describe the Mrs. W's as "they are", not by how they look. Think about someone you are close to, and try to describe who they are, not what they look like.
•Mrs. Whatsit compares our lives to a sonnet; a strict structure for the outside, but complete freedom for the inside. Is this a good way of looking at our lives?
•Why do you think Mrs. Who quoted I Corinthians 1:25 - 28 to Meg before she made her final trip to Camazotz? How did this scripture apply to Meg's situation? Who or what was the "foolish thing" and who was the "mighty" in the book?
Media mix
In 2003, ABC produced a TV movie version of this book. Watch the movie in conjunction with reading the book, then ponder some of these questions:
•In what ways does the movie differ from the book?
•Some of the differences are minor, and are just for the purpose of shortening the story to fit in the allotted time frame. Other differences are major, departing from the book completely. What are some of the major differences, and why do you think they changed those things?
•In the book, there are several references to God and the Bible. Those references are not in the movie. Why do you think they left them out, and does it make the movie better, worse, or no different?
•The ending of the movie, when Meg rescues Charles Wallace from IT, is very different from the book. Why do you think they added to the ending here, and is this a better or worse ending?
Vocabulary
Ms. L'Engle uses a lot of large words in her book. Look at the following words and see if you can define them. First, see if you can understand the meaning from the context of where and how the word is used in the book, then look up the word in the dictionary and see if you are correct. For a little extra practice, try the Vocabulary Word Search.
| Delinquent | Ineffable | Ominous |
| Constable | Askew | Sadist |
| Frivoling | Ephemeral | Deviate |
| Avid | Apprehension | Brusquely |
| Antagonistic | Metamorphose | Defer |
| Inadvertently | Monoliths | Inexorable |
| Dilapidated | Dispersed | Omnipotent |
| Infinite | Perturbed | Systole |
| Conceive | Dissolution | Diastole |
| Dubiously | Facet | Miasma |
| Gnarled | Unkempt | Endowed |
| Serenity | Myopic | Atrophied |
| Subsided | Eon | Corrosive |
| Exclusive | Malignant | Fallible |
| Liniment | Precipitously | Emanate |
| Supine | Propitious | Trepidation |
| Relinquished | Talisman | Counteracted |
| Moron | Resilience | Pungent |
| Belligerent | Aberration | Jeopardize |
| Tractable | Bilious | Temporal |
| Disillusion | Bravado | Distraught |
| Somber | Obliquely | Reverberated |
| Decipher | Tenacity | Ministrations |
| Essence | Hysterical | Simultaneously |
| Morass | Connotations | Unadulterated |
| Corporeal | Pedantic | Exuberance |
| Tangible | Annihilate |
