In my wanderings, one of my favorite sites is the Gutenberg project, named after the inventor of the printing press. On there, I found a book, written in 1884 by a man named Edwin Abbott. The book is call Flatland.
Flatland is a satirical novella, which describes life in a 2-dimensional world, from the view of a inhabitant Square. An entire culture is created, complete with class distinctions and unfair prejudice's based upon a citizens number of sides (a Triangle is lower in class than a Square, a Polynomial is the highest class of all, ect.) all of which quietly mocks the Victorian lifestyle the author lived in.
My favorite thing about the story (so far as I've read, I haven't finished it yet) is that once you think about the idea of a 2-dimensional "man" learning about the 3-dimensional world, you can then take it one step more and start wondering if their is some kind of 4th dimension. From there you build up and up, until surprise! If you look, some of the most cutting edge research being done today, string theory, deals with the idea that there are more dimensions, anywhere from 10 to 26 of them, actually. So, over 120 years ago, a writer with little to no scientific tendencies, is talking about the same stuff that the brains of today's world are thinking about.
Life does enjoy it's funny little circles, doesn't it?
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I see you used your word novella. What's it's origin? It kinda sounds like the myans and their crazy theories of the future. It's freaky to think there were people of the past that some how predicted the future. But I chalk it up coincidence because if they are right then the world is going to end in 2010 and I have plans that year.
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