The foolishness of God is wiser than men; the weakness of God is stronger than men.

The Mrs W’s show up again, reiterating the fact that they’re powerless to do anything on Camazotz themselves, and also saying that it would be pointless to send Mr. Murry or Calvin to rescue Charles Wallace.

There was a long silence. All the soft rays filtering into the great hall seemed to concentrate on Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and the faint light that must be Mrs Which. No one spoke. One of the beasts moved a tendril slowly back and forth across the stone tabletop. At last Meg could stand it no longer and she cried out despairingly, “Then what are you going to do? Are you just going to throw Charles away?”

Mrs Which’s voice rolled formidably across the hall. “[Silence, child]!”

But Meg could not be silent. She pressed closely against Aunt Beast, but Aunt Beast did not put the protecting tentacles around her. “I can’t go!” Meg cried. “I can’t! You know I can’t!”

“[Did anybody ask you to]?” The grim voice made Meg’s skin prickle into gooseflesh.

She burst into tears. She started beating at Aunt Beast like a small child having a tantrum. Her tears rained down her face and spattered Aunt Beast’s fur. Aunt Beast stood quietly against the assault.

“All right, I’ll go!” Meg sobbed. “I know you want me to go!”

“We want nothing from you that you do without grace,” Mrs Whatsit said, “or do without understanding.”

This feels like something of an homage to the Council of Elrond scene in Lord of the Rings, but with a very different sort of protagonist. In the books, there was silence when Frodo offered to take the Ring, because the debate was over. Here, Meg accepts her fate with literal kicking and screaming, because she IS still a child, and by rights, she shouldn’t have to be the one to save her brother, but she’s the only one who has any chance of success.

Meg’s tears stopped as abruptly as they had started. “But I do understand.” She felt tired and unexpectedly peaceful. Now the coldness that, under Aunt Beast’s ministrations, had left her body had also left her mind. She looked toward her father and her confused anger was gone and she felt only love and pride. She smiled at him, asking forgiveness, and then pressed up against Aunt Beast. This time Aunt Beast’s arm went around her.

Mrs Which’s voice was grave. “[What do you understand]?”

“That it has to be me. It can’t be anyone else. I don’t understand Charles, but he understands me. I’m the one who’s closest to him. Father’s been away for so long, since Charles Wallace was a baby. They don’t know each other. And Calvin’s only known Charles for such a little time. If it had been longer then he would have been the one, but- oh, I see, I see, I understand, it has to be me. There isn’t anyone else.”

But Calvin and her father aren’t so easily convinced.

“Mrs- uh- Whatsit.” Mr. Murry frowned and pushed his hair back from his face. Then he shoved with his middle finger at his nose as though he were trying to get spectacles closer to his eyes. “Are you remembering that she is only a child?”

“And she’s backward,” Calvin bellowed.

“I resent that,” Meg said hotly, hoping that indignation would control her trembling. “I’m better than you at math and you know it.”

“Do you have the courage to go alone?” Mrs Whatsit asked her.

Meg’s voice was flat. “No. But it doesn’t matter.” She turned to her father and Calvin. “You know it’s the only thing to do. You know they’d never send me alone if-“

“How do we know that they’re not in league with IT?” Mr. Murry demanded.

“Father!”

“No, Meg,” Mrs Whatsit said. “I do not blame your father for being angry and suspicious and frightened. And I cannot pretend that we are doing anything but sending you into the gravest kind of danger. I have to acknowledge quite openly that it may be a fatal danger. I know this. But I do not believe it. And the Happy Medium doesn’t believe it, either.”

I mean, Calvin suggested the same thing earlier in the conversation, so it makes sense that Mr. Murry might latch onto the idea when he doesn’t really know the Mrs W’s.

Mrs Whatsit explains that, as much as the Happy Medium knows, she can’t see the future with certainty all the time.

“If we knew ahead of time what was going to happen we’d be- we’d be like the people on Camazotz, with no lives of our own, with everything all planned and done for us. How can I explain it to you? Oh, I know. In your language, you have a form of poetry called the sonnet.”

“Yes, yes,” said Calvin impatiently. “What’s that got to do with the Happy Medium?”

“Kindly pay me the courtesy of listening to me.” Mrs Whatsit’s voice was stern, and for a moment Calvin stopped pawing the ground like a nervous colt. “It is a very strict form of poetry, is it not?”

“Yes.”

“There are fourteen lines, I believe, all in iambic pentameter. That’s a very strict rhythm or meter, yes?”

“Yes,” Calvin nodded.

“And each line has to end with a rigid rhyme pattern. And if the poet does not do it exactly this way, it is not a sonnet, is it?”

“No.”

“But within this strict form the poet has complete freedom to say whatever he wants, doesn’t he?”

“Yes.” Calvin nodded again.

“So,” Mrs Whatsit said.

“So what?”

“Oh, do not be stupid, boy!” Mrs Whatsit scolded. “You know perfectly well what I am driving at!”

“You mean you’re comparing our lives to a sonnet? A strict form, but freedom within it?”

“Yes,” Mrs Whatsit said. “You’re given the form, but you have to write the sonnet yourself. What you say is completely up to you.”

This is a unique take on the concept of free will, and I’m not sure if I entirely agree with it (as with much of L’Engle’s philosophy), but she certainly presents it well.

But they’ve finally decided their course of action, so Meg says her goodbyes.

She put her arms about Aunt Beast, pressed up against the soft, fragrant fur. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I love you.”

“And I, you, little one.” Aunt Beast pressed gentle tendrils against Meg’s face.

“Cal-” Meg said, holding out her hand.

Calvin came to her and took her hand, then drew her roughly to him and kissed her. He didn’t say anything, and he turned away before he had a chance to see the surprised happiness that brightened Meg’s eyes.

Well, that’s one way to say goodbye!

At last she turned to her father. “I’m- I’m sorry, Father.”

He took both her hands in his, bent down to her with his short-sighted eyes. “Sorry for what, Megatron?”

Tears almost came to her eyes at the gentle use of the old nickname. “I wanted you to do it all for me. I wanted everything to be all easy and simple….So I tried to pretend that it was all your fault…because I was scared, and I didn’t want to do anything myself-“

“But I wanted to do it for you,” Mr. Murry said. “That’s what every parent wants.” He looked into her dark, frightened eyes. “I won’t let you go, Meg. I am going.”

“No.” Mrs Whatsit’s voice was sterner than Meg had ever heard it. “You are going to allow Meg the privilege of accepting this danger. You are a wise man, Mr. Murry. You are going to let her go.”

It’s nice to see some good parenting every once in a while! Also, I believe this is the first use of the word “Megatron”, which possibly means that Transformers of all things took inspiration from this book.

Mr. Murry sighed. He drew Meg close to him. “Little Megaparsec. Don’t be afraid to be afraid. We will try to have courage for you. That is all we can do. Your mother-“

“Mother was always shoving me out in the world,” Meg said. “She’d want me to do this. You know she would. Tell her-” she started, choked, then held up her head and said, “No. Never mind. I’ll tell her myself.”

“Good girl. Of course you will.”

Then she’s ready to go (or as ready as she’ll ever be), with Mrs Which preparing to take her alone.

“We gave you gifts the last time we took you to Camazotz. We will not let you go empty-handed this time. But what we can give you now is nothing you can touch with your hands. I give you my love, Meg. Never forget that. My love always.”

Then Mrs Who bestows her “gift”.

“What I have to give you this time you must try to understand not word by word, but in a flash, as you understand the tesseract. Listen, Meg. Listen well. The foolishness of God is wiser than men; the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called, but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty. And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought the things that are.” She paused, and then she said, “May the right prevail.”

This is a line from St. Paul, and along the same lines as my personal favorite passage of his (although I’m not fond of his writing in general), which ends with “My power is made perfect in weakness.”

Then, after they tesser, Mrs Which gives her gift.

“[I have not given you my gift. You have something that IT has not. This something is your only weapon. But you must find it for yourself.]” Then the voice ceased, and Meg knew that she was alone.

She heads toward IT as slowly as possible, but she has to confront it sooner or later.

Father said it was all right for me to be afraid. He said to go ahead and be afraid. And Mrs Who said- I don’t understand what she said but I think it was meant to make me not hate being only me, and me being the way that I am. And Mrs Whatsit said to remember that she loves me. That’s what I have to think about. Not about being afraid. Or not as smart as IT. Mrs Whatsit loves me. That’s quite something, to be loved by someone like Mrs Whatsit.

Then she’s with IT again, and with Charles.

As she saw him it was again as though she had been punched in the stomach, for she realized afresh that she was seeing Charles, and yet not Charles at all. Where was Charles Wallace, her own beloved Charles Wallace?

What is it I have got that IT hasn’t got?

“You have nothing that IT hasn’t got,” Charles Wallace said coldly. “How nice to have you back, dear sister. We have been waiting for you. We knew that Mrs Whatsit would send you. She is our friend, you know.”

For an appalling moment Meg believed, and in that moment she felt her brain being gathered up into IT.

“No!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “No! You lie!”

For a moment she was free from ITs clutches again.

As long as I can stay angry enough IT can’t get me.

Is that what I have that IT doesn’t have?

“Nonsense,” Charles Wallace said. “You have nothing that IT doesn’t have.”

“You’re lying,” she replied, and she felt only anger toward this boy who was not Charles Wallace at all. No, it was not anger, it was loathing; it was hatred, sheer and unadulterated, and as she became lost in hatred she began also to be lost in IT. The red miasma swam before her eyes; her stomach churned ITs rhythm. Her body trembled with the strength of her hatred and the strength of IT.

With the last vestige of consciousness she jerked her mind and body. Hate was nothing that IT didn’t have. IT knew all about hate.

IT is an inhuman force, and when we hate, we grow inhuman as well.

“Mrs Whatsit hates you,” Charles Wallace said.

And that was where IT made ITs fatal mistake, for as Meg said automatically, “Mrs Whatsit loves me; that’s what she told me, that she loves me,” suddenly she knew.

She knew!

Love.

That was what she had that IT did not have.

She had Mrs Whatsit’s love, and her father’s and her mother’s, and the real Charles Wallace’s love, and the twins’ and Aunt Beast’s.

And she had her love for them.

But how could she use it? What was she meant to do?

If she could give love to IT perhaps it would shrivel up and die, for she was sure that IT could not withstand love. But she, in all her weakness and foolishness and baseness and nothingness, was incapable of loving IT. Perhaps it was not too much to ask of her, but she could not do it.

But she could love Charles Wallace.

She could stand there and she could love Charles Wallace.

Her own Charles Wallace, the real Charles Wallace, the child for whom she had come back to Camazotz, to IT, the baby who was so much more than she was, and who was yet so utterly vulnerable.

She could love Charles Wallace.

It seems so simple in this day and age, almost like a cop-out, but it works because there’s truth in it. Hatred can only help oppressive systems, like ITs, but truly loving people helps to fight against the darkness, even if only on a personal level. You can’t love an inhuman system, but you can love people.

Charles. Charles, I love you. My baby brother who always takes care of me. Come back to me, Charles Wallace, come away from IT, come back, come home. I love you. Charles. Oh, Charles Wallace, I love you.

Tears were streaming down her cheeks, but she was unaware of them.

Now she was even able to look at him, at this animated thing that was not her own Charles Wallace at all. She was able to look and love.

I love you, Charles Wallace, you are my darling and my dear and the light of my life and the treasure of my heart. I love you. I love you. I love you.

Slowly his mouth closed. Slowly his eyes stopped their twirling. The tic in his forehead ceased its revolting twitch. Slowly he advanced toward her.

“I love you!” she cried. “I love you, Charles! I love you!”

Then suddenly he was running, pelting, he was in her arms, he was shrieking with sobs. “Meg! Meg! Meg!”

“I love you, Charles!” she cried again, her sobs almost as loud as his, her tears mingling with his. “I love you! I love you! I love you!”

A whirl of darkness. An icy cold blast. An angry, resentful howl that seemed to tear through her. Darkness again. Through the darkness to save her came a sense of Mrs Whatsit’s presence, so that she knew it could not be IT who now had her in its clutches.

And then they’re all back home.

Denny’s voice came crossly over the lawn. “Hey, Meg, it’s bedtime.”

Sandy suddenly yelled, “Father!”

Mr. Murry was running across the lawn, Mrs. Murry running toward him, and they were in each other’s arms, and then there was a tremendous happy jumble of arms and legs and hugging, the older Murrys and Meg and Charles Wallace and the twins, and Calvin grinning by them until Meg reached out and pulled him in and Mrs. Murry gave him a special hug all of his own. They were talking and laughing all at once, when they were startled by a crash, and Fortinbras, who could bear being left out of the happiness not one second longer, catapulted his sleek black body right through the screened door to the kitchen. He dashed across the lawn to join in the joy, and almost knocked them all over with the exuberance of his greeting.

Meg knew all at once that Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which must be near, because all through her she felt a flooding of joy and love that was even greater and deeper than the joy and love which was already there.

The Mrs W’s just dropped by to say goodbye before they’re off on their next errand. I don’t believe they ever show up again in the many, many other novels of L’Engle’s expanded universe, but I think it’s enough to know that they’re still working to fight the darkness.

There’s a good reason this book is so influential, particularly to girls and others who were brought up female. While it’s never been universally acclaimed, it clearly sympathizes with children who are in any way “different”, be they queer, neurodivergent, or merely unloved. And the fact that the climax doesn’t involve physical fighting makes it stand out in the current media landscape, even among children’s literature, and especially for a work of science fiction.

Tomorrow, I’ll announce my next (final?) series, which also takes influence from this book…