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2025
2025-09-13, Saturday! 162th day of 452th year

FLATLAND

A Musical Emergency

Adapted from Flatland
by Edwin Abbott Abbott
Musical Emergency * Saturday 2025 September 13 * Omino, Santa Cruz * david poly@omino.com * deb debkakes@gmail.com * 8313326077
Please forgive our roundabout announcement. Under the circumstances we must, for now, speak elliptically. We hope to soon speak plainly and square up with you. These are forbidden topics; there could be consequences if word got to the wrong Circles. There are more dimensions to this than you may realize.

Until then, this topic must remain anchored in thoughtland.

From: OMINO and Musical Emergency HQ
To: You

THE WORLD IS FLAT!

The characters are 2-dimensional!

Yet Edwin Abbot's 1884 masterpiece of mathematical wonders and political satire reveals unrecognized dimensions in our own world!

Only one thing is missing: YOUR musical contributions and multimedia ideas!

Yes, the good people at OMINO and the unspecified participants of the Emergency Arts Collective (*cough* THAT'S YOU *cough*) will bring this flat tale to life! * * * * *

Q: Do I have to write/perform a song?

A: Nope! Bring some food and enjoy the show!

Q: Can I write and perform a song?

A: Yes! Check out the story, let the ideas percolate and watch this space for details!

Q: Can I invite all my friends?!?

A: PLEASE DO NOT INVITE ALL YOUR FRIENDS. You're welcome to invite specific friends if you think they'd appreciate it, but this is a private event for people who know people we know.

Q: Is it OK for kids?

A: Generally speaking it's fine and they'll be welcome, but there will be some naughty language, FYI.

Q: Can I bring food to share?!? Can I dress as a 2-dimensional creature?!?

A: Yes and yes! Covid details: gathering is indoors! Masks not expected or required but always fashionable! Please be considerate of others if you're not feeling well! Please let us know if you have any further questions! Hope you can join us! See less
The Complete Text of Original Novel: here

The Show's Narration: here
To claim a song, email poly@omino.com and debkakes@gmail.com.

Story Points


Any contribution you'd like to make in any media, even if only tangentially related to Flatland, is VERY WELCOME! Anything goes, let me know and we'll sort out a spot for it. Or write it in!

ACT I

  1. A. Square Introduces Himself
  2. A. Square Explains The Natural Order
  3. On the Nature Of Women
    4. •• Deb: The Yodeling Song
  4. Recognition by touch, and color, and the Color Wars
  5. A. Square and his grandson speculate on the 3rd Dimension
  6. A. Square has troubled dreams at the Turn of the Millennium
  7. The Sphere visits A. Square and takes him for a ride
    8. •• Martin: Into Space
  8. The Sphere angrily returns A. Square to Flatland
  9. A. Square obsessively authors a Manifesto of the Third Dimension
  10. His grandson denies understanding the third dimension
  11. A. Square is arrested, and found guilty of dimensional heresy
    12. •• dvb: Order in the Court
  12. A. Square spends twenty five years in prison, and grows to hate the Sphere
  13. Released, he recruits sailors for a Glorious Mission in the Tavern

ACT II

  1. The voyage commences

    2. The eight weeks, as told by QQ

    1. Week 1: The jolly beginning
    2. Week 2: Captain Aha's eccentric ideas of shipboard routine
    3. Week 3: On the Various and Sundry variety of Fish in the Sea
    4. Week 4: A merry food hunt... and revelation of our flatship's third axis
      5. •• dvb "A Pound of Sphere Flesh"
    5. Week 5: Our flatship's journey down a storm vortex to Lineland and Pointland
    6. Week 6: We meet a fellow flatship, who know of our circles... and the Sphere
    7. Week 7: We witness from above the wretched truth about our so-called Nobility
    8. Week 8: Through the straight of triangles, we have found the Sphere.

  2. A great battle
  3. No survivors
  4. The End
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
A Square. A Square is literally a square, perhaps a foot across, in the country of Flatland. He is a mathematician and geometer, and, perhaps unfortunately, learns of the third dimension. After being punished for his beliefs, he now obsessively seeks the truth. Or perhaps merely some sort of closure.
Little H. Little H is A Square's precocious hexagonal grandson. As a child, he played a part in his father's downfall. As an adult, a physicist, he, like his father, knows that the third dimension is real.
Eta aka Tiny H. Eta is A Square's lineal granddaughter. Girls in Flatland are denied education, but she has learned much from A Square's notes, while he was imprisoned. Behind the scenes, Little H owes her much for his success.
The Judges. The triumverate of Circular judges do not wish for knowledge of the Third Dimension to propagate.
The Sphere. A visitor from the Third Dimension. The Sphere descends, and condescends, to reveal to A Square the truth of the Third Dimension, but takes great umbrance at the suggestion that there might be even higher dimensions, the 4th and the 5th, yae even the 8th.
QQ. The hired harpooneer of A Square's later mission of "discovery". They present as a low-grade isoscelese triangle... or are they?
PQ. The PQ is a Flatship built by Little H, Eta, and R, under the command of "Captain" A Square. It has novel capabilities.
Captain Aha's Irregulars. Various men of all classes, rounded up to seek their fortune on this perilous and questionable mission.
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