Flatland · Characters
Character guide
Key figures in Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott.
Skim names here — open a free preview to see character cards and Character Web beside the page as you read.
The Narrator (A Square)
major
Also known as Unknown, me, O, mine, himself, yourself
He is a middle-class mathematician and householder in Flatland, proud of his rank and fluent in its geometry, who narrates his own memoir with the confidence of a man who believes he has seen everything worth seeing. That confidence is his flaw: when a visitor begins demonstrating impossible motions, the Square resists, argues, and finally reasons his way toward a truth his whole society is built to deny. His willingness to be convinced, and the cost of that conviction, drive the book's central arc.
The Sphere
major
Also known as Sphere, The Sphere, himself
He arrives as a Circle to the Square's eyes, growing and shrinking in ways that seem like conjuring, and reveals himself as a missionary of higher dimensions permitted to speak only once in a thousand years. His method is analogy — point to line, line to square, square to cube — but his frustration mounts when his pupil cannot follow, and he alternates between tenderness and imperious command. He matters because he forces the book's central question: what would it take to see past the limits of your own world?
The Stranger
major
Also known as Stranger, the Stranger, thy, Your, your
He appears without warning, speaks from the depths of nowhere, and refuses to be touched or measured, slipping out of the Square's world even as the Square presses against him. What begins as an intellectual duel — the Stranger posing questions about points, lines, and squares — becomes a plea for belief, and then a demonstration by deeds when words fail. His insistence that he sees inside closed things, and his willingness to risk everything on one convert, make him the engine of the Square's awakening.
The Circles
supporting
Also known as the Circles, their, themselves
They sit at the apex of Flatland's hierarchy, their many-sided bodies approaching the ideal Circle and their authority approaching the divine, ruling through a priesthood that tolerates no irregularity. Their beauty is real, but so is their ruthlessness: they suppress knowledge that threatens the established order, including any hint of a third dimension. They matter because they represent the system the Square's new vision will inevitably collide with, and because their perfection is the book's most seductive trap.
Chromatistes
minor
Also known as Chromatistes
A leader of the Chromatic Sedition, advocating for color reform in Flatland.
The Isosceles
supporting
Also known as the Isosceles, Every Isosceles, an Isosceles, themselves
With two equal sides and a narrow apex, they are the working class and the army, their acute angles making them dangerous both to enemies and to the social order. Flatland's regime manages them through a mix of brutal regulation and the faint hope that their descendants might, over generations, become less pointed and more respectable. They matter because they expose the cruelty beneath the Square's tidy world, and because their capacity for revolt shadows every claim of stability the narrator makes.
Many of the Highest Circles
minor
Also known as many of the highest Circles , sitting as judges in law courts, their
Elite judges from the priestly class who enforce Flatland's laws.
