What do you think?
Rate this book
The Planiverse: Computer Contact with a Two-Dimensional World
A classic book about life in a two-dimensional universe, written by a well-known author. Now brought back into print in this revised and updated edition, the book is written within the great tradition of Abbott's Flatland, and Hinton's famous Sphereland. Accessible, imaginative, and clever, it will appeal to a wide array of readers, from serious mathematicians and computer scientists, to science fiction fans.
278 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
About the author
A.K. Dewdney
21 books28 followersAlexander Keewatin (A.K.) Dewdney is a professor of computer science at the University of Western Ontario, a mathematician, environmental scientist, and author of books on diverse subjects.
Wanderers of cyberspace may discover something about my life as a mathematician and computer scientist, environmental scientist, conservationist, and author of books and articles.
The name "Keewatin" is an Ojibway word meaning "north wind."
The name ":Dewdney" is from the French/Jewish name, "Dieudonne."
Wanderers of cyberspace may discover something about my life as a mathematician and computer scientist, environmental scientist, conservationist, and author of books and articles.
The name "Keewatin" is an Ojibway word meaning "north wind."
The name ":Dewdney" is from the French/Jewish name, "Dieudonne."
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews
February 17, 2022
The characters are uniformly flat and two-dimensional, but for once that's a good thing.
November 21, 2015
A lot of people have written sequels and homages to
Flatland
, and most of them only managed to live up to the original by virtue of that original not being very good to begin with. When people call Planiverse ``a worthy successor'', though, they are doing it a disservice.
The Planiverse started its life as (what has consistently been called) a monograph titled Two-Dimensional Science and Technology, and much of the book's quality can be credited to Martin Gardner's picking up and advertising that monograph in Scientific American; dozens of clever people, including physicists, geologists, and engineers, wrote in with elaborations, corrections, and suggestions, almost all of which apparently made it into the novel.
The story itself isn't all that interesting—it lacks Flatland overt satire, which is probably for the best; when Stewart tried to include a feminist message in Flatterland , it just came off as ham-fisted and patronising—but it doesn't really need to be. Flatland's asshole sphere is traded for a bunch of college students and a teleprinter (which is adorable), its top-down view for a more interesting side-scroller, and its endless confusion over dimensions for an exploration of the physical implications of a two-dimensional world.
The result is a compelling novel which I'm surprised hasn't been made into a short film or video game yet. Apparently it inspired Creatures (dude, remember Creatures?), but I don't think that counts.
Actually, if anyone wants to do the art for a game, I'm up for the programming side of things.
The Planiverse started its life as (what has consistently been called) a monograph titled Two-Dimensional Science and Technology, and much of the book's quality can be credited to Martin Gardner's picking up and advertising that monograph in Scientific American; dozens of clever people, including physicists, geologists, and engineers, wrote in with elaborations, corrections, and suggestions, almost all of which apparently made it into the novel.
The story itself isn't all that interesting—it lacks Flatland overt satire, which is probably for the best; when Stewart tried to include a feminist message in Flatterland , it just came off as ham-fisted and patronising—but it doesn't really need to be. Flatland's asshole sphere is traded for a bunch of college students and a teleprinter (which is adorable), its top-down view for a more interesting side-scroller, and its endless confusion over dimensions for an exploration of the physical implications of a two-dimensional world.
The result is a compelling novel which I'm surprised hasn't been made into a short film or video game yet. Apparently it inspired Creatures (dude, remember Creatures?), but I don't think that counts.
Actually, if anyone wants to do the art for a game, I'm up for the programming side of things.
May 22, 2007
Simply one of the best and most detailed/well-thought-out alternate worlds ever presented in print. From the computer simulation (oh, how I wanted to play with exactly such a program) through which the protagonists make contact with a complex, living two-dimensional world, to the many illustrations detailing that world's flora, fauna, architecture, engineering, and art: a delight. Plus Yndred's a cool fellow.
June 23, 2010
This book taught me to appreciate the third dimension.
January 9, 2023
I've managed to snatch this at a library sale for the equivalent of 5 cents and to this day it remains maybe the best deal I've ever made. Long story short, it's about an alien 2D universe, going to great lengths to depict it as plausibly scientifically "2D" as possible, down to the microbiological level: one extensive, nerdy worldbuilding exercise that much differs from its satirical-political inspiration, Flatland (which failed to capture my interest). The framing of the story - students messing with mainframes in an early 80s computer lab - must surely be a treat for anyone who still enjoys the vintage atmosphere of retro-computing; even the way the text switches into monospace font for the computer terminal parts resembles the layout of 80s-90s programming manuals. I love how much care went into the graphical aspect of the book: all of the discussed vignettes of the 2D world life are lovingly depicted as B&W images accompanying the text almost like in some alien biology textbook, and are essential for immersion into the whole concept. Absolute cult.
September 1, 2012
Such an addictive, wild journey of a book! Why this doesn't have more of a cult following, I will never understand.
While it isn't entirely flawless, I couldn't help but give it 5 stars. A book has not excited me this much in a very long time.
While it isn't entirely flawless, I couldn't help but give it 5 stars. A book has not excited me this much in a very long time.
June 6, 2015
A delightful exploration of an alternate universe which had me looking at our 4 dimensions in a whole new way
September 16, 2015
Non so se la versione pubblicata nel 2000 e ripubblicata nel 2013 di questo libro sia più aggiornata rispetto all'originale del 1983 che mi sono comprato di seconda mano. Ma in fin dei conti già questa prima versione è molto interessante, perché porta alle conseguenze estreme quanto Edwin Abbott Abbott scrisse in Flatland. Quel libro era in effetti nato come una satira contro la società vittoriana, e gli abitanti bidimensionali non erano certo tratteggiati biologicamente oppure nella loro competenza tecnica. Qui invece Dewdney fa un lavoraccio, aiutato da tantissima gente che si era appassionata agli articoli sul planiverso pubblicati nella rubrica dei giochi matematici di Martin Gardner. La trama del romanzo è un po' deboluccia, ma in realtà essa è solo un modo per mostrare, sfruttando un personaggio bidimensionale di nome Yendred, cosa si può fare in un mondo a due dimensioni. Il punto chiave è che non c'è abbastanza spazio, in tutti i sensi: un essere vivente non può per esempio avere un tubo digerente dalla bocca all'ano, perché si troverebbe diviso in due parti. Eppure l'ingegnosità degli ardeani, gli abitanti di quel mondo, permette loro di fare praticamente quello che facciamo noi, solo in modo diverso. Leggere il libro permette di capire che non sempre ciò che siamo abituati a fare è l'unica soluzione possibile, e dunque ci amplia i nostri spazi.
August 9, 2015
My mind rebelled at the obvious, to me at least, flaws in the logical premise of the book. I know this is fiction, but you have to draw the line somewhere. Straight from the prolog we get off on the wrong foot. The 2D world is in a computer. I am fine with that. The computer is in a high school. What? The world has been created by the students programing it. Your kidding right? When the 2D world encouters a 2D being that communicates with the students and teacher they see a graphical change to the image of the being. So a spell was just cast because there is no way for that to happen, I don't care how good you are at programing.
They made a working climate. No they made a fake climate that ignores physics. The inhabinates of the world live underground, in homes that could not be built according to the weather they created without flooding. See if you dig a hole you have to put the material you remove somewhere. Where you put it becomes a dam and there is no way to take down the dam without killing yourself. Trust me I gave this some thought and there is no way to get this done.
That is just 2 chapters into the book. I just can't bring myself to read more of this crap.
They made a working climate. No they made a fake climate that ignores physics. The inhabinates of the world live underground, in homes that could not be built according to the weather they created without flooding. See if you dig a hole you have to put the material you remove somewhere. Where you put it becomes a dam and there is no way to take down the dam without killing yourself. Trust me I gave this some thought and there is no way to get this done.
That is just 2 chapters into the book. I just can't bring myself to read more of this crap.
August 18, 2022
This is a brilliant description of life in a two-dimensional world. The concept is that through the use of a computer simulation the instructor and his students gain contact with one of the inhabitants of the world. It is that contact that gives the details about the 2D world.
What makes this such a fascinating book are the many illustrations. From simple things like how do the inhabitants get past each other when traveling in opposite directions to complex issues such as the construction of their underground dwellings all are covered.
Of the thousands of books I have read during my lifetime, The Planiverse ranks among my top three. Perhaps that is why I am reading it for my third time.
This is an excellent read, especially for the science minded readers.
What makes this such a fascinating book are the many illustrations. From simple things like how do the inhabitants get past each other when traveling in opposite directions to complex issues such as the construction of their underground dwellings all are covered.
Of the thousands of books I have read during my lifetime, The Planiverse ranks among my top three. Perhaps that is why I am reading it for my third time.
This is an excellent read, especially for the science minded readers.
Read
March 11, 2017I found this to be a totally absorbing look into life in two dimensions. Far more detailed and thought out than, "Flatland", The Planiverse follows characters across their flat environment and explains how all their structures work. I found an epiphany at the end when one of the characters finds a way to leave the 2-D landscape and enter the 3-dimensional world.
Shelved as 'books-with-go-references'
June 14, 2010Naturally, go is a one dimensional game in this flatland-style universe.
July 4, 2023
After reading The Planiverse, with its monumental achievement of creating a whole two-dimensional universe in a book of under 250 pages, you could be excused for finding many of the classic examples of fictional world-building positively unimaginative. As I see it, one of Dewdney's main tasks in writing this book was to as closely approximate the universe and Earth as possible with this ever-present two-dimensional constraint: a constraint that produces enormous ripple effects on absolutely everything in the Planiverse and its inhabited world of Arde, from particle physics and biology to Ardean culture and the fate of the Planiverse itself, and means that nothing in any of these domains can ever be taken for granted; instead, everything needs to be — and, in fact, was — built up from scratch.
But The Planiverse is more than a feat of technical imagination; it's a story, too, almost a sort of portal fantasy in which a professor of computer science (named Dewdney) and a few of his students accidentally stumble on a method of communication with an Ardean named Yendred who's about to go on a pilgrimage across the Ardean continent of Ajem Kollosh. When I read the first edition of Dewdney's novel when I was a child, say around nine, I enjoyed it enough that, along with other such favorite childhood portal fantasies of mine as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and The Phantom Tollbooth, it acquired a fixed foothold in my imagination (and, by the way, was already far more to my taste than the dystopian Flatland). Reading the Millennium Edition of The Planiverse now, my estimate of the book has been, if anything, revised upward (along with a disbelief at how I could have possibly understood some of the more esoteric aspects of, say, the technical design of an Ardean fishing boat when I was nine). As far as I'm concerned, The Planiverse not only tells a gripping story, but integrates it satisfyingly with the science and general two-dimensional unexpectedness that form its conceptual framework.
What is that story about? Well: one interesting thing to me about The Planiverse is the way that, as Yendred's plot advances, the amount of technical description in the chapters actually noticeably decreases. To me, the most difficult parts of the main narrative to understand from a technical perspective, despite the presence of the illustrations Dewdney provides throughout the book, were the explanations of Ardean biology and architecture in chapter 2, and the aforementioned fishing expedition in chapter 3, of an 11-chapter novel. I believe that this is an intentional reflection of the progress of Yendred's pilgrimage, from the material to the spiritual. Here, I was helped out immensely in my understanding of the book by Philip J. Stewart's (spoilerful) article "Allegory through the Computing Class" (whose title of course itself is a clever reference to Lewis Carroll), which I found linked from the book's Wikipedia page and read prior to my reread of The Planiverse — no wonder, for example, that the name of the Ardean town of Maj Nunblt is so reminiscent of that of the story of Layla and Majnun! The idea of the spiritual quest, anyway, is the real narrative current of this novel. The part of me that goes through my life with very little attention given to scientific mechanisms is most grateful.
I find The Planiverse to in fact be a beautiful balance of, on the one hand, technology and ingenuity, and, on the other, spirit and feeling. The book's weakest point for me was in the character of (the human student) Hugh Lambert, the "computer game hotshot" who is sometimes parodically ignorant of basic human matters. As a warning, within the two-dimensional context of Arde there are also mentions of rape, and occasional on-page violence. I would say, by and large, though, that The Planiverse remains possibly my favorite science fiction novel of all time, with Dewdney's talent for fiction seemingly mostly wasted in his other, primarily non-fictional writings. Like Invisible Cities for fantasy, it challenges writers of the genre, more than most works that are even recognized as part of that genre, to up their game posthaste!
But The Planiverse is more than a feat of technical imagination; it's a story, too, almost a sort of portal fantasy in which a professor of computer science (named Dewdney) and a few of his students accidentally stumble on a method of communication with an Ardean named Yendred who's about to go on a pilgrimage across the Ardean continent of Ajem Kollosh. When I read the first edition of Dewdney's novel when I was a child, say around nine, I enjoyed it enough that, along with other such favorite childhood portal fantasies of mine as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and The Phantom Tollbooth, it acquired a fixed foothold in my imagination (and, by the way, was already far more to my taste than the dystopian Flatland). Reading the Millennium Edition of The Planiverse now, my estimate of the book has been, if anything, revised upward (along with a disbelief at how I could have possibly understood some of the more esoteric aspects of, say, the technical design of an Ardean fishing boat when I was nine). As far as I'm concerned, The Planiverse not only tells a gripping story, but integrates it satisfyingly with the science and general two-dimensional unexpectedness that form its conceptual framework.
What is that story about? Well: one interesting thing to me about The Planiverse is the way that, as Yendred's plot advances, the amount of technical description in the chapters actually noticeably decreases. To me, the most difficult parts of the main narrative to understand from a technical perspective, despite the presence of the illustrations Dewdney provides throughout the book, were the explanations of Ardean biology and architecture in chapter 2, and the aforementioned fishing expedition in chapter 3, of an 11-chapter novel. I believe that this is an intentional reflection of the progress of Yendred's pilgrimage, from the material to the spiritual. Here, I was helped out immensely in my understanding of the book by Philip J. Stewart's (spoilerful) article "Allegory through the Computing Class" (whose title of course itself is a clever reference to Lewis Carroll), which I found linked from the book's Wikipedia page and read prior to my reread of The Planiverse — no wonder, for example, that the name of the Ardean town of Maj Nunblt is so reminiscent of that of the story of Layla and Majnun! The idea of the spiritual quest, anyway, is the real narrative current of this novel. The part of me that goes through my life with very little attention given to scientific mechanisms is most grateful.
I find The Planiverse to in fact be a beautiful balance of, on the one hand, technology and ingenuity, and, on the other, spirit and feeling. The book's weakest point for me was in the character of (the human student) Hugh Lambert, the "computer game hotshot" who is sometimes parodically ignorant of basic human matters. As a warning, within the two-dimensional context of Arde there are also mentions of rape, and occasional on-page violence. I would say, by and large, though, that The Planiverse remains possibly my favorite science fiction novel of all time, with Dewdney's talent for fiction seemingly mostly wasted in his other, primarily non-fictional writings. Like Invisible Cities for fantasy, it challenges writers of the genre, more than most works that are even recognized as part of that genre, to up their game posthaste!
January 24, 2019
At the forefront, I think the “sequel of Flatland” appellation usually given to Planiverse does much disservice to it. Rather, a simple “Flatland-inspired world” ought to be enough to pay homage to Abbott’s masterpiece without causing subconscious comparisons between the two while reading.
Overall, it is an intriguing book to read, and the general tone is of scientific inquisition, something I enjoyed significantly. Kudos to the author’s imagination and his scientific rigor in wanting to make our lower-dimensional (or were they? ;) ) brethren seem plausible to the skeptic-minded.
More than a narrative structure, the book reads as a world-building exercise and a sort of thinly-veiled (or rather with a thin padding of a story) fable presenting the author’s attempt at scientifically sound construction of 2D equivalents of the sciences. The intricate animal biology, the mechanical constructs of the Planiverse mechanics and the allied descriptions, are interspersed with occasional parallels (satirical?) with our own societies’ political constructs.
On the down side, I felt it was very little story and too much world building. A lot of excessive descriptions of the 2D-universe gets a little stale after a while, especially the really redundant pieces towards the middle part. Here is where the Flatland comparison is detrimental, since not only does Planiverse not enjoy the element of first-time intrigue as did Flatland, but also lacks the general strength of story that was important in the latter. Moreover, many ideas are repeated (Although Planiverse adds a great deal to the universe and is considerably different from that of Flatland). Some parts were laboriously slow moving, and I felt the ending was a bit too abrupt and perhaps, unnecessarily cryptic.
Final Verdict: A free-time read. A great read for those who have not read Flatland, a moderate-to-good read for those who have. Enjoyable if you like world-building books.
July 15, 2018
A little slow in the beginning, but a fascinating thought experiment in action. This book not only sparked my imagination wondering what the rest of Arde looks like, but it pleased the analytical portion of my brain as well. There is a surprising amount of real life science that backs up a lot of what is stated in the book. I have no doubt that if we were able to observe a 2 dimensional world such as the one described in the book, a lot of the theoretical science would be confirmed. I found the students to be no different from Yendred the Ardean: two dimensional. They were unnecessary characters that didn't contribute to the story much. If you can look past the paper thin plot that sets up Yendred's adventures in the Planiverse, you won't be disappointed. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoyed Edwin Abbott's "Flatland", which should be mandatory reading before tackling this book. Also if you are particularly interested in any of the STEM fields, please give this book a look. There's plenty of science in here to excite you.
October 29, 2020
I'm not sure if this is fiction with a really well fleshed out world or non-fiction with a story to disguise it. My library says the Dewey Decimal code is 530.8 so non-fiction it is!
The book is cool. It traces a college class as they interact with a character in a 2D world. But it is *really* well thought out. There is a lot of biology and physics at first - underground houses, doors, how beings move about, eat, etc. There is a separate language pattern and alphabet that comes up. As the main character moves through the world, he goes into space and sees schools, factories, etc. There's an appendix with more science too.
There were lots of images which really helped visualize what was going on! The book ends by speculating about more dimensions which was a fitting end.
I enjoyed reading this book whether it is classified as fiction or non-fiction!
The book is cool. It traces a college class as they interact with a character in a 2D world. But it is *really* well thought out. There is a lot of biology and physics at first - underground houses, doors, how beings move about, eat, etc. There is a separate language pattern and alphabet that comes up. As the main character moves through the world, he goes into space and sees schools, factories, etc. There's an appendix with more science too.
There were lots of images which really helped visualize what was going on! The book ends by speculating about more dimensions which was a fitting end.
I enjoyed reading this book whether it is classified as fiction or non-fiction!
September 3, 2022
8/10
A delightful work of sci-fi that is genuine in its pursuit of science as fiction (rather than another blasters-and-aliens reskin), the Planiverse’s primary drawback - and, frankly, appeal - is the fact that it completely abandons the plot upon its conclusion. I was drawn in by the tales of Yendred and Arde, the two-dimensional planet he inhabits, and was dismayed by the sudden conclusion to the story. However, this conclusion was not exactly surprising, and the novel does a terrific job establishing expectations from the get-go. I’m always a sucker for mathematical and scientific diagrams, and so taking those into a theoretical, two-dimensional space was enlightening. One of the most engaging books I’ve read this year, but I will caution that I take that perspective as a math man first and foremost.
A delightful work of sci-fi that is genuine in its pursuit of science as fiction (rather than another blasters-and-aliens reskin), the Planiverse’s primary drawback - and, frankly, appeal - is the fact that it completely abandons the plot upon its conclusion. I was drawn in by the tales of Yendred and Arde, the two-dimensional planet he inhabits, and was dismayed by the sudden conclusion to the story. However, this conclusion was not exactly surprising, and the novel does a terrific job establishing expectations from the get-go. I’m always a sucker for mathematical and scientific diagrams, and so taking those into a theoretical, two-dimensional space was enlightening. One of the most engaging books I’ve read this year, but I will caution that I take that perspective as a math man first and foremost.
June 7, 2020
A technically fascinating look at a two dimensional universe this book is also a surprisingly sweet story of friendship, adventure, spirituality and self discovery with a wistful, bittersweet ending. Vastly more sophisticated in both plot and execution than Flatland, this is a fully functional two dimensional universe. Yendred, the protagonist, is a fully formed and sympathetic character whose adventures will have you on the edge of your seat. The writing style is very economical and that this is all accomplished in such a concise fashion is a lesson to authors who take two or three times as many pages to achieve far less. I think this book should have broad appeal from early teens upwards.
April 12, 2023
While the Planiverse is not plain, it is a rather predictable story. Sci-Fi delving into the discovery of a 2D Universe through a computer simulation project, where a team of students and researchers communicate with a being of said universe through their Terminal and try to understand the implications of a 2D world. We follow them as they discover more and more about the universe's laws of physics, biology and society. While some aspects seemed very obvious, a few concepts were fun to play around with.
November 20, 2020
Wonderfully fun exploration of a two dimensional world. This book is similar to Flatland in that the story follows the life of a two dimensional creature, although Flatland was much more of a social commentary.
The book includes many excellent illustrations and some basic explanations of how physics would work in two dimensions. I read it in my teen years when I became fascinated with dimensions.
The book includes many excellent illustrations and some basic explanations of how physics would work in two dimensions. I read it in my teen years when I became fascinated with dimensions.
August 17, 2017
Flatland for speculative fiction fans, instead of Victorian-era satire. Two-dimensional biology and physics are given amazingly detailed treatments. Really interesting read even for a general audience. Wish it was much longer.
September 15, 2020
I read this as a kid - and have re-read it again many times over the years. An incredible piece of imagination. Incredibly detailed and emotionally moving. This is simply one of my favorite books of all time.
October 16, 2022
Reading this in 1984, it completely opened my late teen brain to difference. Difference between my life and a two dimensional one. I haven’t yet read flatlands and my ageing brain might read it differently today. It set me on a sci fi reading life and also one where abstraction was required. I think I should read this again and also Flatlands.
April 1, 2018
While embedded in a bit of a melodramatic story, the description of a universe of only two dimensions is interesting and much more detailed than the story in Flatland.
January 26, 2019
Biology evolution lectures
January 4, 2020
What a wild premise. If you thought Flatland was kind of cool but kind of stupid, this is Flatland if the author actually really thought about it... like really thought about it. Ideas for two-dimensional physics, biology, mechanics, games, social customs, and theology. Plot? Not so much. But who needs plot when you can find out how digestion works in two-dimensional animals!
October 19, 2020
A fictional story that serves as a good exploration of how biology, mechanics and weather could work in a 2D environment.
The plot's kinda crummy, though.
The plot's kinda crummy, though.
October 17, 2021
incredibly constructed, reads (almost) like non-fiction
January 21, 2022
A bit of an anachronism but quite good.
December 12, 2023
As a technical, academic exercise in theorizing how a 2d world could exist this book is tour-de-force. But the *story* takes very much a back seat to that and isn't very satisfying.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews