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I have discovered new evidence in the de Grummond Children´s Literature Collection at the University of Southern Mississippi that reveals L´Engle´s defense of the imagination is in fact an important, overlooked theme of the Time Quartet. Perhaps the greatest find in the collection is the original, unpublished transcript of A Wrinkle in Time, which includes an alternate "Aunt Beast" chapter as well as a deleted chapter. Due to omissions, the published book obscures many themes of the Time Quartet, including L´Engle´s defense of the imagination. These new resources also suggest that L´Engle´s idea of the imagination and themes of the Time Quartet were significantly influenced by the ideas of George MacDonald and Albert Einstein. A study of these influences and new resources alongside L´Engle´s published material indicates that L´Engle in fact synthesized MacDonald´s idea of the religious benefits of using the imagination with the intellectual, scientific advantages associated with Einstein´s use of the imagination, and in doing so, L´Engle created in her Time Quartet a hybrid defense of imagination all her own called "Sacred Idleness."

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Rodney Mooney has been published worldwide in journals and a featured speaker in many conferences due to his research of the connection between religion and the imagination, as well as his discoveries on Madeleine L´Engle´s "books about time." He is currently a professor of the Language Arts at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College.

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