It’s how we use them

“But of course we can’t take any credit for our talents. It’s how we use them that counts.” (Madeleine L’Engle, A Wrinkle in Time)

“Do you think things always have an explanation?”

“Yes. I believe that they do. But I think that with our human limitations we’re not always able to understand the explanations. But you see, Meg, just because we don’t understand doesn’t mean that the explanation doesn’t exist.” (Madeleine L’Engle, A Wrinkle in Time, 47)

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Joy from Pain

“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.” (Madeleine L’Engle, A Wrinkle in Time, 130)

Day 2, Quote 2

Next quote! This one comes from one of my ALL-TIME FAVORITES. Yes, that just got all-capped and bolded. I am shouting it from the rooftops. I can’t count how many times I’ve read A Wrinkle in Time, and I’m captivated every time. I have four pages of quotes from this book, but there is one that I have used over and over and over in my life.

It comes as Meg, Calvin, and Mr. Murry are fighting the power of IT, and Meg begins to recite the Declaration of Independence . . .

“We hold these truths to be self-evident!” she shouted, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” . . .

“But that’s exactly what we have on Camazotz. Complete equality. Everybody exactly alike.”

For a moment her brain reeled with confusion. Then came a moment of blazing truth. “No!” she cried triumphantly. “Like and equal are not the same thing at all!” (Madeleine L’Engle, A Wrinkle in Time, 146; emphasis added)

Love love love. I love Meg Murry in all her snaggle-toothed, impatient, good-hearted imperfection.

Today, I’m tagging Emily at For the Bookish. I love Emily’s posts–so fun and genuine! The challenge is to post one quote a day for three days, tagging another blogger each day to participate as well. Have fun!

Venturing into Graphic Novels

In the continuing spirit of trying new things, I decided it was time to try that genre I’ve avoided for a long time: graphic novels. The book that convinced me it was time to try was A Wrinkle in Time: the graphic novel, originally by Madeleine L’Engle, adapted and illustrated by Hope Larson.

Honestly, I probably shouldn’t have started out my graphic novel adventure with an adaptation of one of my favorite books of all time. That’s just setting it up for failure. BUT I will say that I enjoyed the illustrations much, much more than I expected. While Larson’s interpretation of the story was vastly different from my own, it was very beautifully drawn and expressed.

Unfortunately, there’s only so much of L’Engle’s incredible writing that you can fit into a graphic novel. While Larson did a good job of fitting in many of the good, powerful lines, there were still so many that were missing, and I was left completely unfulfilled. A graphic novel can’t hold a candle to the power of words.

That being said, I’m willing to try again. Like I said, it wasn’t totally fair to start out with an adaptation of an amazing book. So tell me—have you read any graphic novels? Which would you recommend?