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| The Entertainment Review |
| By: Chelsea Cain & Marc Mohan Publisher: Chronicle Books |
Many people have been transfixed by the idea of a world inside the Earth. In “Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious
History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizations, and Marvelous Machines Below
the Earth’s Surface,” author David Standish doesn’t just write one of the longest titles in human history, but also an
enjoyable, entertaining and informative book on the history of speculation about a world within the world. It is a
wonderful case study for those who are interested in strange ideas that don’t go away, such as the biblical account
for the origin of the universe.
The book is a collection of authors, some that are charming and some not quite so much, but the list of those
involved in spreading the hollow earth idea includes some of the brightest scientific luminaries of the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries. As Standish point out, Edmond Halley was an early proponent of the idea of an inner
world, suggesting that no fewer than three hollow, concentric spheres that float independently beneath the surface of
this world, suggesting that there three spheres might actually be self-contained world, each with its own source of
heat and light and each filled with living creatures.
Standish devotes several chapters not so much to the actual belief in a hollow earth, but instead to the exploitation of
the concept brought up by fiction writers, including Edgar Allen Poe, L. Frank Baum, Jules Verne and Arthur Conan
Doyle. None of these authors believed in the validity of Symmes Holes, rotating hollow spheres, yet all of them used
mysterious and unexplored worlds inside the earth as a setting, the curious stage on which their fictional dramas took
place. In locating their lost worlds in the interior of the earth, these authors and many others were part of a long
tradition of placing invented worlds in places that are unattainable as a result of location and distance. Writers and
movie producers have long done this same thing, from Plato who placed Atlantis in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
and a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, George Lucas positions his action of the Star Wars series. For the
authors that did their work in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the idea of a hollow earth was not a
fixation but it was more of the fact that it was a convenient piece for fiction writing, an expedient place to location
amazing new worlds.
One criticism that many readers may have with Standish’s book is the fact that he devotes too much of the book,
three and a half chapters out of eight, to the literary exploitation of the hollow earth concept. It would have been far
more interesting to great much more extensive discussions of late twentieth and early twenty first century ideas of the
hollow earth concept, an issue that is only lightly touched on in the final chapter of the book.
Of course this is only a minor issue. A majority of the information in the book is wonderfully written and offers readers
an enjoyable chance to get swept up in the idea of another world. “Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of
Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizations, and Marvelous Machines Below the Earth’s
Surface” belongs on the bookshelf of every historian, scientist, literature enthusiast and fan of fiction, especially
those who are interested in strange ideas that don’t seem to go away.
History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizations, and Marvelous Machines Below
the Earth’s Surface,” author David Standish doesn’t just write one of the longest titles in human history, but also an
enjoyable, entertaining and informative book on the history of speculation about a world within the world. It is a
wonderful case study for those who are interested in strange ideas that don’t go away, such as the biblical account
for the origin of the universe.
The book is a collection of authors, some that are charming and some not quite so much, but the list of those
involved in spreading the hollow earth idea includes some of the brightest scientific luminaries of the seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries. As Standish point out, Edmond Halley was an early proponent of the idea of an inner
world, suggesting that no fewer than three hollow, concentric spheres that float independently beneath the surface of
this world, suggesting that there three spheres might actually be self-contained world, each with its own source of
heat and light and each filled with living creatures.
Standish devotes several chapters not so much to the actual belief in a hollow earth, but instead to the exploitation of
the concept brought up by fiction writers, including Edgar Allen Poe, L. Frank Baum, Jules Verne and Arthur Conan
Doyle. None of these authors believed in the validity of Symmes Holes, rotating hollow spheres, yet all of them used
mysterious and unexplored worlds inside the earth as a setting, the curious stage on which their fictional dramas took
place. In locating their lost worlds in the interior of the earth, these authors and many others were part of a long
tradition of placing invented worlds in places that are unattainable as a result of location and distance. Writers and
movie producers have long done this same thing, from Plato who placed Atlantis in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean
and a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, George Lucas positions his action of the Star Wars series. For the
authors that did their work in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the idea of a hollow earth was not a
fixation but it was more of the fact that it was a convenient piece for fiction writing, an expedient place to location
amazing new worlds.
One criticism that many readers may have with Standish’s book is the fact that he devotes too much of the book,
three and a half chapters out of eight, to the literary exploitation of the hollow earth concept. It would have been far
more interesting to great much more extensive discussions of late twentieth and early twenty first century ideas of the
hollow earth concept, an issue that is only lightly touched on in the final chapter of the book.
Of course this is only a minor issue. A majority of the information in the book is wonderfully written and offers readers
an enjoyable chance to get swept up in the idea of another world. “Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of
Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizations, and Marvelous Machines Below the Earth’s
Surface” belongs on the bookshelf of every historian, scientist, literature enthusiast and fan of fiction, especially
those who are interested in strange ideas that don’t seem to go away.
