Flatland

Edwin A. Abbott. Flatland: a romance of many dimensions. San Francisco: Arion Press, 1980.

Aluminum binding, illustrated with line drawings and diecuts.

Written by a Victorian schoolmaster in 1884, Flatland is a satirical work about a carefully mapped two-dimensional world in which a three-dimensional reality is unimaginable to the inhabitants.  Through the use of mathematics and geometry, Abbott’s text comments on limited understandings of reality and thought.  This special edition translates the book’s content into its form.  Bound in aluminum and assembled with an accordion binding, the book can be opened entirely as a flat, two-dimensional plan, measuring 66 feet long.  Once refolded, it is again a three-dimensional object.

Link: Dwell article and video about Abbott’s Flatland.