Inspired by Reading: A Wrinkle in Time

The latest book selection for the Inspired by Reading Book Club was A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle.  I've been eagerly awaiting this one since this book has a special place in my reading history.  I'm a little late getting my post up... more on why in a bit. 

Just two of the many covers that this book has had over the years.

Even though I do own a copy of the book in my personal collection, I waited to borrow one from the public library because I wasn't convinced that my "vintage" copy would withstand me reading it.  It's a copy from my childhood and is pretty yellow and brittle, but it does have the cover I grew up with... the one on the right in the picture above.  I was oddly put off by the cover of my borrowed library copy... it was the one on the left above and was created by famous husband and wife illustrator team Leo and Diane Dillon.  I really enjoy much of their work and they're even responsible for some of my all time favorite book covers (you can see an archive of their work HERE) but I just found this cover slightly off-putting for some reason.  I'm not sure that I would have picked the story up as a kid if that had been the cover on the copy I found.  Maybe I'm just reacting because it's not the version with which I'm familiar.  If you're interested to see the other cover versions, click HERE.  Did anyone else have a reaction to the cover art for this one?  or another favorite that you went back to revisit? 

Ok, pushing past the cover art and onto the book itself!  A Wrinkle in Time was first published in 1962 and has been continuously in print ever since.  If you know anything about the publishing world, you know that this is a pretty amazing feat!  Part of that longevity can be attributed to the fact that Wrinkle won the prestigious Newbery Medal... but it's bigger than that since plenty of award winners have gone out of print.  I was curious to re-read the story to see how I responded to it as an adult.

I first read this book when I was in elementary school and an older cousin let me borrow a copy.  I was instantly hooked and had to speed through and read the two sequels that existed at that time (A Wind in the Door and A Swiftly Tilting Planet).  Unfortunately, for me at least, you can't go home again.  My adult re-read of Wrinkle left me disappointed to say the least.  I feel really guilty about my reactions... it feels like a betrayal of my youth services librarian roots or something.

Part of it is that Wrinkle falls into the same trap as many stories that are written as contemporary fiction... what was totally normal life in 1962 feels quite dated in 2016.  Genre fiction (with the exception of maybe mystery) can often get around this pitfall since they are set in another time and place... well defined and different from our own.  But it was more than that, the dialog just didn't work for me.  Yes, the slang was beyond outdated, but the dialog was generally clunky in my opinion.  I really don't mean to trash a children's classic... it made me sad that I just couldn't get immersed in a story that had so captivated me once upon a time.  I hope I'm just a weirdo and others still can find a connection here... I just didn't.  (Eric tried to read it but had to put it down for similar reasons and because he wanted to hold onto as much of his original reading experience as possible.) 

Because of my lackluster response to the book, I had a really hard time coming up with any sort of jewelry design based on it.  I really pushed myself to make something... anything... just because I wanted to reflect on my reactions to the book.  Here is what I ended up with:       

I finally settled on doing something to play off of the idea of the "Dark Thing" around the dark planet of Camazotz (and many others) as well as travel through outer space.  I started with a pair of lampwork beads by Firelily Glass that have darker tones to them and what feels like a alien sort of pattern to them (at least in my mind!)  I mixed in some dark black and grey Czech glass, brass, crystal, and some moon and star beads in brass tones.