Non-Euclidean Geometry - Fiction

Fiction

Non-Euclidean geometry often makes appearances in works of science fiction and fantasy.

In 1895 H. G. Wells published the short story The Remarkable Case of Davidson’s Eyes. To appreciate this story one should know how antipodal points on a sphere are identified in a model of the elliptic plane. In the story, in the midst of a thunderstorm, Sidney Davidson sees "Waves and a remarkably neat schooner" while working in an electrical laboratory at Harlow Technical College. At the story’s close Davidson proves to have witnessed H.M.S. Fulmar off Antipodes Island.

Non-Euclidean geometry is sometimes connected with the influence of the 20th century horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft. In his works, many unnatural things follow their own unique laws of geometry: In Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, the sunken city of R'lyeh is characterized by its non-Euclidean geometry. It is heavily implied this is achieved as a side effect of not following the natural laws of this universe rather than simply using an alternate geometric model, as the sheer innate wrongness of it is said to be capable of driving those who look upon it insane.

The main character in Robert Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance mentioned Riemannian Geometry on multiple occasions.

In The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoevsky discusses non-Euclidean geometry through his main character Ivan.

Christopher Priest's The Inverted World describes the struggle of living on a planet with the form of a rotating pseudosphere.

Robert Heinlein's The Number of the Beast utilizes non-Euclidean geometry to explain instantaneous transport through space and time and between parallel and fictional universes.

Alexander Bruce's Antichamber uses non-Euclidean geometry to create a brilliant, minimal, Escher-like world, where geometry and space follow unfamiliar rules.

In the Renegade Legion science fiction setting for FASA's wargame, role-playing-game and fiction, faster-than-light travel and communications is possible through the use of Hsieh Ho's Polydimensional Non-Euclidean Geometry, published sometime in the middle of the twenty-second century.