The third meeting of the Fall 2025 AWM Book Club was on Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, by Edwin A. Abbott. Originally published in 1884 as a satire on the gender and social hierarchies of Victorian-era society, Flatland gained popularity in the 1950s and 1960s, when the sci-fi genre was on the rise, and is today regarded as a classic of mathematical fiction.
Flatland takes place in a two-dimensional world where “women – thin, straight lines – are the lowliest of shapes, and where men may have any number of sides, depending on their social status.” We learn about Flatland through the perspective of narrow A. Square, a mathematician and respectable member of educated society.
Through strange occurrences that bring him into contact with a host of geometric forms, Square has adventures in Spaceland (three dimensions), Lineland (one dimension) and Pointland (no dimensions) and ultimately entertains thoughts of visiting a land of four dimensions[.] (from Goodreads)
The story provided a framework for discussions on:
- Social relations in a society somewhat mirroring our own
- Conceptualizing higher dimensions
- Challenging status quos
- Enlightenment, and the social isolation that may follow