New Wrinkles: Lost Pages of L'Engle's Classic Recovered

If you were like me, you devoured L'Engle's books as a kid. Now, it seems that her granddaughter has discovered some missing pages. Apparently, they were among the massive edits she had to make to get her book published because editors were afraid the book was too complex for kids as it was.

There's also a strong possibility that the section was cut as part of a massive series of edits L'Engle went through in trying to get her manuscript published. A Wrinkle In Time was rejected by several publishers, many of whom thought the book was too complex for kids. Even when John Farrar of Farrar, Straus and Co. decided to move forward with the book, he warned L'Engle not to be disappointed by what he thought would likely be slow sales.

Although when the pages are read, it seems that L'Engle got into name-dropping some historical figures and revealing some political stuff, so there is that easy answer that they were chopped to take that context out.

The easy answer is that the pages were cut because they outline too clearly some political beliefs within the story. L'Engle name drops not only Hitler, but Khruschev, Mussolini, Mao, and Castro. And while calling out some historical monsters isn't such a bad thing to do, it's a lot more politically-charged than a lot of L'Engle's work.

There is also one quote that sticks out about the need for security in democratic societies.

This sick longing for security is a dangerous thing, Meg, as insidious as the strontium 90 from our nuclear explosions that worried you so...

Seems maybe L'Engle was a wise lady.

Intriguing!

The Wrinkle in Time series was some of the first books beyond what could be considered children's books that I read myself and was a big fan.
I can see why some of that would have been edited out honestly. Text left that "politically charged" as they put it might have prevented me and thousand of other children from reading it, OR may have caused the readers to lost interest.

Still, even with her Universalism tendencies, her books opened up big doors for me and although I read the most of the Austin Family series, I was always a little bummed that she didn't stick to the more sci-fi nature as seen in the O'Keefe series.