#Flatterland

[flatland-fuckery]

[rjalker]

Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, by Edwin Abbot Abbot, published in 1884, is public domain. That means it has no copyright, and belongs to everyone.

This post will have links to as many versions and adaptations of it as I can find, and will be updated whenver I find new links to add.

Feel free to copy and paste this whole entire post and make it a new post for your own blog too!

None of these links are piracy, because you literally cannot pirate what has no copyright. Anyone who tells you you must pay to read the original Flatland is scamming you.

The only time you should be spending money on Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, is if you find a cool physical copy that you want specifically.

Check the original post before reblogging to look for updates if you are seeing this post days, weeks, or months after I originally post it.

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Visual books:

Public domain:

The Original Novel:

Read online or ownload the original book in multiple formats from Project Gutenberg

Read or download from Standard Ebooks

Read and download from the Internet Archive. This also includes a computer-generated audiobook.

_

The 2024 translation:

Read online or download the 2024 translation in multiple formats from the Internet Archive. This also includes a computer-voiced audiobook.

Read the 2024 translation here on tumblr @flatland-a-2024-translation

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Audiobooks:

The original novel:

Listen to the original book on the Internet Archive, read by Ruth Golding

Listen to the original book on the Internet Archive read by David "Grizzly" Smith

The 2024 translation:

Listen and read-along with the lazy audiobook of the 2024 translation on Youtube

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Free visual media with full stories:

Here’s an animation from 1965. Contains some flashing lights.

Here’s a stop motion film from 1982 in Italian with English subtitles

Here’s an animation from 2006

The 2007 Flatland film by Ladd Ehlinger is free on youtube. Unfortunately Ladd Ehlinger is a virulently racist and misogynistic conservative who thinks feeding school kids is the same thing as slavery. His film is filled with almost constant flashing lights and spinning cameras that cause headaches, motion sickness, migraines, and seizures.

Here is a link to timestamps for these if you still choose to watch it.

The film ignores all of the politics from the original novel because the creator of the film agrees with the bigotry the novel condemned. You are much better off watching another visual adaption or reading the original or translated book.

Especially if you suffer from photosensitivity or motion-sickness, this film will make you want to throw up.

___

Shorter visual media:

In-universe

Part 4 of a Korean animation. from 2010. Haven't found parts 1-3 yet.

A short animation from 2020 showing an Equilateral being taken away from his Isosceles parents

Flatland Heist from 2013, A short animation from 2013 where the Narrator and Sphere team up to rob a bank :)

Flatland a Romance of Many Dimensions Alternate Timeline (without audio yet) 2024 Here's the version with audio

No Nonbinary Door 2024

A Visit to Lineland 2024

Up, Up, and Away 2024

Meta:

A short TED-Ed summarizing the math parts of Flatland from 2014

Another short animation explaining the math of Flatland from 2012

A long presentation (38 mins) about the math in Flatland. from 2017

Youtube Shorts:

A very short animation about the narrator meeting the Sphere

___

Related books by other authors, in publishing order:

Public domain:

An Episode of Flatland: or How a Plane Folk Discovered the Third Dimension. With Which is Bound Up an Outline of the History of Unæa by Charles Howard Hinton. (1907) Public domain, unlimited reading and downloading. It's terrible. But you can rewrite it to make it not terrible.

Other copyright:

The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics by Norton Juster (1963) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. A short....poem? Nothing to actually do with Flatland.

The Incredible Umbrella by Marvin Kaye (1980) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. I have not read it yet.

Sphereland: A Fantasy About Curved Spaces and an Expanding Universe, by Dionys Burger. (1983) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. It's racist. Was intended to be a sequel to Flatland, but the author's racist and failed every lesson Flatland tried to teach.

“Message Found in a Copy of Flatland” by Rudy Rucker (1983) free to read online from the author.

The Fourth Dimension, by Rudy Rucker (1984). Can be read for free online from the author. I have not read it yet.

The Planiverse: Computer Contact With a Two-dimensional World by Alexander Keewatin Dewdney (1984) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. Good 2D worldbuilding, nonexistant plot and boring abrupt ending.

Flatterland: Like Flatland, Only More So by Ian Stewart (2001) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. it's useless crap that unironically defends the bigotry against Irregulars from the original novel by pretending it's just natural selection that's totally natural and not at all artificialy and violently upheld to uphold the supremacy of the Circles.

Spaceland by Rudy Rucker (2002) Can be borrowed by 1 person at a time. I have not read it yet.

VAS: An Opera in Flatland (2002) by Steve Tomasula. no copies donated to the internet archive yet. I have not read it yet.

__

Neopronoun short stories:

The Breaking Point, a short story of a Line and Isosceles in another country of Flatland, attempting to deal with an abusive officer of the military who's invited himself into their home. Almost 4k words.

Gaining a New Perspective, a short story of the Sphere contemplating everything that's happened after throwing the narrator of Flatland back down to his plane. Almost exactly 5k words.

Other short fiction:

[link me your stories and a short summary to go here!!]

__

Please feel free to add more links and I'll add them to this original post.

Here's the first masterpost I made which has fewer links.

[mr-cosmic-11]

Reading flatterland and it feels like a fanfic made by a 12 years old on wattpad...?

I mean, I've only read like 21 pages so far... so Idk

[waxdream]

Trigger warning - adoption, suicide, trauma, objectification.

I need to talk about adoption in Flatland. I'm adopted, so the details of this part of the story are a bit hazy due to dissociation. But like, Abbott has so many little points in his book that it impresses me. I can't tell if he did it on purpose, but if he did, damn am I impressed.

I went to the foundling museum in London a few years ago. I cried a lot, seeing the stolen items, and the exhibition of 'adoptees/orphans/fosterlings in comic books' that was downstairs. That was my favourite museum exhibition ever. My item I had from my birth mother is a candle that sits on my shelf. It's blue, and I didn't know what it was for a long long time, until one day I was about to throw it away. Luckily, I asked my adoptive mother if she wanted it, and she told me what it was. I almost threw part of my history away.

Which leads me into flatland, and the equilateral triangles. A class of adoptees. The only adoptions mentioned in the book are forced apon triangle families by the state for 'angular purity', and in order to give higher class people with an inability to have children the chance to adopt. In a modern context, I would take this as a scathing read of the adoption system. Only lower class, male children with desireable qualities are eligible for this kind of class crossing adoption, and the birth family celebrate it. The lower class is indoctrinated into thinking that 'this is for the best'.

In the UK at the time of my adoption, I've been told the desirable child was a white baby girl with no obvious disabilities, blonde hair and blue eyes. My foster carers were ineligible to adopt me, and the cynic in me believes this was because I was considered an object with 'desireable' qualities. The shadow court in my mind says 'it could have made some rich middle class family very happy' when I'm feeling grumpy and objectified. Luckily, a charity helped fund my foster (now adoptive) family's court battle, and a law change in the second year of it allowed them to win. I got lucky.

I see a lot of parallels between my own adoption and the adoptions in Flatland. People saying 'it's for the best', who don't realise that many adoptions take place because poor, mentally ill and young people can't take care of children because of lack of support and money. The scalene triangles in Flatland could have raised the equilateral merchant class, given enough resources and better schooling. Just like how A square is able to Tutor his grandson Hex - a lawyer teaching someone of a higher class skills he himself does not necessarily need to know.

I can't help but think about how those trinkets didn't stay with the foundlings who lived in that house. How I almost threw my candle away. The triangles have the physical reminder of their shape, and yet still, they are told they are different. They are regular, not like those other triangles, "you're one of us, you always have been", a square father might say to his new son. "We deserve to have you". And then, when the triangle grows up, and his wife (who's own father was a square) gives birth to an irregular triangle, the filth of that triangle's DNA is shown once again, despite the outward appearence of regularity. That's what my own adoption feels like. I always waited to be revealed for the imposter that I was. But I wonder if in a way that feels cathartic for them - like the immense relief I felt when my adoptive mother saved my candle from the trash. It's proof that your adoption exists, that you exist as a complex, multifaceted shape.

I wonder if the pressure of being regular was removed from that man's shoulders when his son was not born a square, but a triangle. Maybe his wife divorced him and he remarries within his original class - a safer, more understand place. Is that a happy ending? Is there a happy ending for adoptees? I never used to think there was. I used to think my life would end soon. Not today but tomorrow, or other similar things I'd tell myself. "I'd be content if I died today" would be said often by the regular triangle.

I wanted to be a hexagon when I thought about what shape I'd be. But no, the humble equilateral triangle is for me. He was not born a girl like I was. But perhaps they're also non binary like me.

Noone is born thinking they are tainted. You're taught that by other people. The regular triangle is told to their face they are normal, and nothing is wrong, that their adoption never affected them. When the regular triangle realised they're trans and autistic, and had that validated, that's when they felt like a real shape. Not a doll. Not an object. I still feel tainted sometimes. It's hard not to when society teaches you your DNA is wrong. And sadly, I think that's a feeling so so many of us feel - adoptees and non adoptees alike.

Your DNA is not wrong. That's a lie. It's a dangerous lie that permeates modern society, not out in the open but under covers. Every time someone says 'it's not the same' in regards to adoption, it's a perpetuation of that lie.

If your feelings are that adoption as lesser, you need to seriously examine your mindset. Because it's a mindset that holds DNA as sacred, as important. And having that mindset is something that easily divides us as a people - it's giving an inch. What's important is who we are, our life experiences, the things that make us different from each other and the points in our lives that shape us. Society shapes us. Racism and patriarchy and homophobia and ableism - these negatives do shape us. DNA has a place in who we are too, but my point is that there's so much more to it than that. The friends we discover, the things we learn, growing as people, the beauty in the world.

And I had to learn that the hard way, because the only thing that society teaches adoptees is that they're replacements. Second best. Whatever other words you have for 'btech birth kid'. Just know, any fellow adoptees, that none of that is true.

I'm happy to answer questions, because I doubt my point is coming across as well as I wanted. The triangles have got me feeling sad, and I haven't even researched phrenology yet. To clarify all my points, adoption feels sucky, racism is awful, you are more than just what society tells you you are, I am the triangle (apart from all the marriage stuff - replace that part with learning I'm trans and autistic, it serves the same purpose in my narrative).

[dipperpines-kin]

The two Flatland books i got for Christmas!

[presidentcircles-assistant]

Space Hopper and Vikki @therealstara

[lurking-latinist]

anybody read Flatterland by Ian Stewart? I read it at a Formative Age; it’s a quasi-sequel to Edwin Abbott’s Flatland that covers things like hyperbolic geometry and the geometry of spacetime and black holes and things

and for me it’s one of those things that you reread and you say “oh THAT’S where my taste came from”

[2d-dreams]

i like to think that Flatterland's Vikki walks like this. i love this book but also not. dislike at least a 80% of the flatland stuff. Everytging else good. but like. why shoes on a Line. they dont shy away from "theyre literal shapes" so how tf is she wearing a SKIRT and JACKET simultaneously. how tell them apart. Why .

[ID: A simple digital drawing with a grey background showing a character made up of a line with an eye in a sequence of four movements leaning over to do a headstand. End ID.]

[apostleofthreedimensions]

In Ian Steward's Flatterland his A Sphere replacement is THIS FUCKING THANG!!!!!!!!!

[twiigbranch]

I want 2 start a book list in 2023 and write down all the things I read.....bc I read so many good things in 2022 but I dont remember all of them sadly. + looking at lists n organizing my information into lists is fun for me

[bracketsoffear]

Was there any book that lost on a second round or further (so no eligible for the Redemption bracket) that you personally thought deserved better?

Well. Basically every Doctor Who book, for starters, but that's just because I've read most of them. mmm.

Stranger: This one did qualify for the redemption poll but then immediately lost again, so I'm counting it: The Frandidate. I loved that series, and the idea of constructing a politician persona that then subsumes your own identity and desires to what is most electable at that moment really deserved more attention. Should it have swept? No. But it should've at least won one round.

Desolation: Scorch Atlas deserved to go all the way. I fuckin' love ergodic literature.

Spiral: Flatland, though I prefer its spiritual sequel, Flatterland, by Ian Stewart.

Hunt: Rogue Male deserved to go up against The Most Dangerous Game

Vast: OF THE CITY OF THE SAVED SHOULDA BEEN A SEMIFINALIST. That book gave me the heebie-jeebies and an existential crisis. The Nothing Equation deserved to sweep, but it's my own fault for having it up against Kaleidoscope so early.

Dark: FEAR OF THE DARK MY BELOVED

Web: No, actually. I have some gripes about round 1, but I won't get into them before the redemption tourney.

Corruption: Eater of Wasps definitely deserved another round at least. Some of the grossest imagery I've ever read, and the fire extinguisher scene should've given it an edge.

Flesh: Chicken, Chicken. That book fucked me up as a kid. My favorite Goosebumps book. I get why it didn't beat Island of Dr. Moreau, but in my heart it deserved to.

Slaughter: In the Blood should've beat Hunger Games. The horror of the Hunger Games, to me, is less to do with the violence as violence, and more to do with the Eye and Web aspects of how they have to make themselves appear, have to debase themselves, have to make a story in order to appeal to the Capitol and the viewers. In the Blood is much more directly about rage and violence and the terrible toll they take.

Buried: Lungbarrow. Should've been a semifinalist at least.

Lonely: Not really.

End: Antsy Does Time should've beat The Graveyard Book. I don't think it could've gotten farther than that given that it would've been up against Shadows from the Walls of Death, but it did deserve another round.

Eye: The Watchers and Harriet the Spy.

Extinction: Silent Spring deserved to be a finalist and Plutopia deserved another round

Other: THE CROOKED WORLD THE CROOKED WORLD THE CROOKED WORLD THE CROKED WORLD THE CROOKED WORLD THE CROOKED WORDL THE CROOKED WORLD

[flatland-fuckery]

this is a real book I paid real money on, written by this guy, this is not a self-insert fanfic written by a 12 year old

[rjalker]

Why does this keep happening?

[ID: An MS Paint drawing showing a scribbled hand holding up a grey square labeled, "A. Square, everything wrong with society", with the person holding up the square saying from offscreen, "This is the narrator, A. Square. He's a horrible person who's wrong about everything. He supports eugenics, slavery, the oppression of women, and the murder of children." Across the image is a cartoon face with big eyes with dilated pupils and sparkles, labeled, "(too many people), grinning and saying, He's right about everything and has never done anything wrong in his life!". End ID.]

The reason Ladd Ehlinger glossed over all of the politics from the novel is that if he criticized A Square's bigotry, he'd have to criticize himself. Because he's a racist misogynistic conservative who thinks feeding school kids is the same thing as slavery and that black people are all violent and if we don't jail them at disproportionate rates they'll just go around killing people all the time.

This also applies to the fandom if people are gonna keep woobifying A. Square and pretend he's "just a silly guy" while ignoring all of the politics of the story.

[charlesoberonn]

Have you ever read Flatterland (Ian Stewert)? It's a sequel to flatland that keeps going with the concept. Highly recommended if you need more two dimensional content.

I have not. I should, though.

[accessible-flatland-art]

Here's a post with tips for writing your own image descriptions.

If you have Flatland OCs you regularly post art of, and would like to help me at least tag them properly, here are the tags I use for this blog, saved to a notepad for easy copying and pasting as needed.

If you want to help, you can go through these and create a specific tag cluster for your different OCs for me to copy and paste.

Just pick out whatever here is relevant to your OCs, and put it in a paragraph, separated by commas. It should include their name, anything you think people would want to search for (like Queer characters), and if applicable, the title of any stories they appear in.

I have been considering adding tags for the shapes of each characters, so you can add that in as well. (Ie: Rectangle, Cube, Straight Line, Kite, ect)

Then you can send me the results in an ask, and I'll be able to save those to a document, so all I have to do when I reblog your OCs is copy it in and all the right tags will show up.

You can have each character's tags separated by a paragraph.

IE:

Billie: [paragraph of tags separated by commas]

Bomb: [paragraph]

Joe: [paragraph]

I'm not sure what the character limit is for asks these days, but feel free to send as many at a time as you can fit in an ask.

Including the names of the characters in your art whenever you post them will also help.

_____

described images, described art, Flatland, Flatland art, Flatart,

transcribed audio, transcribed lyrics, lyrics, music,

Photoedits,

Physical books,

Flatland a Romance of Many Dimensions, Flatland Illustrations,

Book collections, Flatland collections,

The Color Revolt, Configurationism, Circularchy,

Stylized form, Literal form,

Flatland animals, Flatland rabbit, Flatland bees, Flatland horse, Flatland chicken, Flatland dog, Flatland cat, Flatland mouse,

Flatland technology,

Flatland anatomy, Flatland worldbuilding, Flatland cosmology, Flatland structure,

A Square, A Sphere, The Grandson of a Square, A Square's Wife, The Wife of A Square, The Sons of A Square, The Great Great Great Great Great Grandfather of A Square, The King of Lineland, The Monarch of Pointland, Chromatistes, Chromatistes the Pentagon,

memes, Flatland memes,

Public domain characters in Flatland, Flatland versions of characters,

Public domain characters,

Family Trees, Comic, Animation,

Flatland OCs, Original characters, Flatland original characters,

Character reference,

Disabled characters, Neurodivergent characters, Physically disabled characters, Characters with mobility aids, Characters with disability aids, Characters with prosthetics, Characters with canes, Characters with walkers, Characters with swimmers, Characters with glasses, Characters with wheelchairs, Characters with chairs, Characters with sleds, Characters with crutches, Characters with rollators, Characters with scars, Characters with facial differences, Characers with limb differences, Characters with visual impairment, Blind characters,

Queer characters, LGBTQIA+ characters, Gay characters, Bi characters, mspec characters, Lesbian characters, Trans characters, Nonbinary characters, Characters who use neopronouns, Aroace characters, Aspec characters,

Black Characters, Characters of color,

Irregular characters, Deirregular Characters,

Werestars, Stellanthropes, Shapeshifters, dragons, serpents, weredragons,

Characters with wings,

Sphereland, Flatterland, The Arts of Being, The Breaking Point, Neopronouns in Action, Flat Dreams, Flatterland, Flatland the film 2007, Flatland the movie 2007,

Neopronouns in Action 062, Neopronouns in Action,

Neopronouns in Action 090, Neopronouns in Action,

A 2024 Flatland Summary,

Tarzan of the Apes, Mickey Mouse,

Dayo,

Esther Flat Dreams, Nora Vigenere, Nora Flat Dreams,

Pollux Codex, Madelyn Schwarz-Carver, Hunter Schwarz, Marianne Smith, Michael the Misogynist Pentagon, Providence, Nature, Providence and Nature, Germs, Mr Square, A Shape,

Oblisi,

Liam,

A Son of A Square,

Cy,

Frau Line,

Lily Cipher,

Ruth Galton, Ruth, Liz, Elizabeth Huntsworth, Stella, Orbis, Irene Huntsworth, Mama Huntsworth, Chief Jr, Atlas Huntsworth, Atlas, Vance,Vance Huntsworth, Elijah, Elijah Huntsworth, Jasper,Jasper Huntsworth, 01 Isosceles,

Vincent, Trey,

Rutabega,

Hauntlight the Irregular Line, Cenotaph the rabbit aether, Sirenade the Irregular Multiangulus, Raptigan the _, Avispa Oro, Beatris Baker, Mo Guy, Unnamed characters, Billie Bob and Joe, Billie the Straight Line, Bob the Circle, Joe the Hexagon,

Jerult the Irregular Kite, Cairis Garret the Equilateral Triangle, Letel the Isosceles Triangle, Aralinda the Straight Line, Leteralinda the Straight Line, Ambrosine the Straight Line, Lucille the Straight Line, Carolayn the Kite, Tristram the Isosceles Triangle,

Arsenn Lupin, Arsene Lupin, AScrossover, Arsene Lupin crossover, Ortence Daniel, Hortense Daniel,

Flyssa of Ib-Wa, Dearg of Ib-Wa, Lieutenant Kellite the Configurationist, Grandna Tuokeli,

Vikki Line, Victoria Line, Lee Line, Jubilee Line,

Huffy,

Bill Cipher, Gravity Falls, GFcrossover, The Book of Bill, The Mother of Bill Cipher, The Father of Bill Cipher, Dipper Pines, Mabel Pines, Ford Pines, The Axolotl, Andrew Kryptos, The Mosaic,

Carlton,

Randie,Gravity Falls, GFcrossover,

Spacelanders, Flatlanders, Linelanders, Pointlanders, Hyperspacelanders, Higher Dimensional Beings, Beings From Unknnown Dimensions, Planiversers,

Alternate Universe Forms,

Video, autoplay, GIF, Autoplay, WIP animation, Unnamed Animation 001, Animation,

Flatland Merch, Art you can buy, Art you can print,

Art templates,

plush, plushies, arts and crafts,

Ty for adding it to the original,:), ID added in reblog, ID in original,:),

Plain text ID added in reblog, Original ID in ALT text, :),

[dipperpines-kin]

Some Flatland-esk books I'm going to try and find for my Flatland collection

1. Sphereland by Dionys Burger

2. The Planiverse by Kee Dewdney

3. The Annotated Flatland by Ian Stewart