In Madeleine Engle’s A Wrinkle In Time, recently adapted by
cartoonist Hope Larson, evil is something undefined and unknown.
It’s the Darkness, enveloping space all around us almost
imperceptibly. More than unknown, it’s unknowable. Meg,
L’Engle’s young heroine sees the darkness all around her,
feeling it’s influence on the world but she can’t know what it
is. It’s something beyond her. Likewise, so is good. These are
things she knows about and knows exist but they’re nebulous
concepts even as she’s drawn into the battle of good vs evil.
Compared with a lot of youth-oriented fiction (Harry Potter and
its ilk,) where the evil is big, obvious and unmissable, L’Engle
doesn’t define the Darkness in her novel. Her enemy isn’t as
easy and defined as Voldemort. Meg has to face a challenge
that’s much bigger than a person or a thing. She has to face a
force of nature and how do you fight that? How do you fight a
storm or an earthquake or a heat wave? How do you face a
darkness that’s consuming a galaxy? But L’Engle d