Resumen
Resumen de Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Para quién es
For curious readers who love puzzles of space and logic, and anyone who enjoys sharp satire of class and prejudice.
De qué trata este libro
Flatland is a short novel published in 1884 by Edwin Abbott Abbott, a London schoolmaster and clergyman. He put on the title page the name A Square, the name of the book's narrator. The story is set in a world with only two dimensions, where every person is a flat shape that moves across a surface like a coin sliding on a table.
Abbott wrote it for two reasons at once. He wanted to make the idea of extra dimensions easy to picture, and he wanted to poke fun at the rigid rank and the unequal treatment of women in Victorian England. In this book you will meet a society ruled by angles, a king who cannot imagine a second direction, and a visitor who tries to teach a Square about Space. Let us begin with the world itself and how its people live in it.
En este resumen
- 1A world with length and width onlyFree
- 2Your rank depends on your angles
- 3Women, colour, and the fear of difference
- 4A dream of a world even smaller
- 5A visitor from beyond the plane
- 6What the book is really about
Idea clave 1 de 6
A world with length and width only
The narrator, A Square, opens by telling us that he lives in Flatland. Its people are not able to look up or down, because up and down do not exist for them. Think of a vast sheet of paper with shapes moving over it, never rising and never sinking below it. The Square writes to readers he calls the lucky people of Space, who can see this whole world from above.
He explains how a Flatlander sees. Nobody can view a shape as we view a drawing, since that needs a look from outside the plane. Everyone sees only a line, because the eye meets the edge of another figure and nothing more. A mist always hangs about, and the nearer edge looks brighter than the farther one. People learn to judge a shape by how that brightness fades.
Because sight is so uncertain, Flatlanders have other habits. Some feel each other, using a polite and careful touch that tells the angles. The lower classes are taught to do this from childhood. Greeting a stranger by feeling his corners is as normal there as a handshake is here.
The Square describes the houses too. Most of them are five sided, a shape that is safer for passers by than a sharp cornered house. He writes as a proud, well-meaning citizen, and his tone is calm and a little pompous. That tone makes the strange facts feel even stranger and more funny.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who’s who
- A Square
- A respectable lawyer and narrator, he takes Flatland’s social ranks for granted and teaches his curious grandson.
- The Stranger from Space
- A spherical visitor from three dimensions, he challenges A Square’s belief that reality has only length and width.
- The Grandson
- A Square’s young hexagonal grandson is a clever pupil whose questions challenge his grandfather’s understanding of geometry.
- The King of Lineland
- The ruler of a one-dimensional world, he rejects A Square’s attempts to explain directions beyond his line.
- The Circles
- Flatland’s priests and rulers stand above A Square in rank and defend their society’s strict hierarchy.
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 34,000 words
- Reading timeAbout 2 h 15 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary; paperback, hardcover and large print at cost
- LanguagesEnglish and 10 other languages
Questions about Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
What is Flatland about?
Flatland is about a flat world where people are geometric shapes, told by a Square. It describes the strict social order there, then shows how the Square is challenged to imagine dimensions beyond his own.
Is Flatland a true story?
No, it is a work of fiction, published in 1884. Abbott invented the world as a way to explain dimensions and as a satire of Victorian class and the place of women.
Who is A Square in Flatland?
A Square is the narrator, a lawyer and a respectable member of the four sided class in Flatland. Abbott used the name as his pen name on the first edition.
Is Flatland hard to read?
No. It is short and the geometry is simple. The first half is a description of the world, and the second half is the story.
What is the main message of Flatland?
The main message is that every mind sees only part of reality and tends to mistake its limits for the truth. It also shows how social rank and prejudice can seem natural to those within them.