Madeleine L�Engle has a knack for writing books that require more thought�about love, about life, and about the nature of evil�than most of the books I have read in my life. It�s true of her adult books. It�s even more true of her children�s books. I�ve been in love with Madeleine L�Engle�s books for years. I�ve been in love with her writing ever since I first read, �A Wrinkle in Time.� Unfortunately, they seem to be about to destroy it.

Disney is making a miniseries of the book. If the previews are any indication, they will ruin the book. Perhaps it is not Disney�s fault. Some books naturally lend themselves to television. Ramona is almost as charming theatrically as she is in a book. Others simply belong to the world of individual imagination. Rendering them in the real world makes them look tawdry, shallow, and lifeless�or worse�especially when the company rendering them misses the essence of the experience.

One of the first clues of impending literary disaster is that the Meg of the series does not wear glasses. If they have made Meg look like the popular kids, I�ll never forgive them. Meg�s awkwardness is her greatest charm. The whole point of Meg is that she is on the edges of any social set. She is ill at ease in her own skin. In short, she is very much every twelve or thirteen year old girl�s inner self, the self that is afraid that everyone is prettier, smarter, and more competent.

I foresee a television show that looks very much like a science fiction world. But �A Wrinkle in Time� is not so much science fiction as dream world. While what things look like matters in a dream world, how they feel is equally, if not more, important. When Meg goes through evil in the book, she almost freezes and we freeze with her. The rhythmic throbbing of �It,� the centralized brain that almost overpowers Meg�s brother Charles who is more intellect than feeling, is as key to �It� as the sound of �It� or the look of �It.� With the screen doing our imagining for us, our imaginings become as ill-suited to the subject as Meg is ill-suited to the two-dimensional world she almost lands in.

In short, I fear they are ruining time�and I can�t bear to watch.

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