Edwin A. Abbott

Writer

• Born: December 20, 1838
• Birthplace: London, England
• Died: October 12, 1926
• Place of death: Hampstead, London, England

Biography

Edwin A. Abbott was born in London, England, on December 20, 1838. He was reared in the Church of England and was educated at St. John’s College, Cambridge University, where he received a degree in divinity.

In 1862, Abbott took ordination in the Church of England. For two years, he held the post of assistant master at the King Edward School in Birmingham. In 1865, he became headmaster of the prestigious City of London School, where he would remain for twenty-four years.

One of Abbott’s goals as headmaster was to improve the study of English at the school. In order to do so, he led the older pupils in reading the works of such major writers as William Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser, John Milton, Francis Bacon, Alexander Pope, and Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Abbott also developed new ways to teach grammar and composition. His first published work was a study of the differences between the grammar used in Shakespeare’s time and that of the late nineteenth century. The breadth of Abbott’s interests is indicated in the fact that his early works included a concordance to Pope’s works, a book about how to write, another on grammar, and a historical novel titled Philochristus: Memoirs of a Disciple of the Lord (1878). In 1875, Cambridge University recognized Abbott’s already impressive scholarly achievements by appointing him a lecturer.

Among Abbott’s publications were many on theological subjects, including several close studies of the Gospels. He wrote two important works about the Oxford Movement within the Church of England, taking issue with one of its leaders, John Henry Newman, who in 1845 left the Church to become a Roman Catholic priest and later a cardinal. Abbott’s Philomythus, an Antidote against Credulity: A Discussion of Cardinal Newman’s Essay on Ecclesiastical Miracles (1891) and The Anglican Career of Cardinal Newman (1892) argued against Newman’s medievalism and in favor of conventional Anglicanism, which could make room for modern science.

Abbott also edited the works of Francis Bacon, the Renaissance philosopher who defined the scientific method, and later published a critical biography of Bacon. However, the work for which Abbott became best known was inspired by the geometry texts used by his pupils. Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, which was published pseudonymously in 1884 as a work by “A. Square,” was set in a two-dimensional world, with imagined or real visits to worlds of one and of three dimensions. Flatland was at once an entertaining mathematics lesson, a science fiction novel, and a social satire.

Abbott retired from the City of London School in 1889 but continued writing and publishing for almost three decades. He died in Hampstead on October 12, 1926. Although he was an influential educator and a prominent scholar, he is best remembered as the author of Flatland , which after over a century is still widely read and continues to inspire sequels, commentaries, and even comic books.