American Hollow Earth Narratives from the 1820S to 1920
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American Hollow Earth Narratives From the 1820s to 1920 Thesis submitted in accordance with the requirements of the University of Liverpool for the degree of Doctor in Philosophy by Michelle Kathryn Yost August 2014 Abstract With the disappearance of terra incognita from nineteenth century maps, new lands of imagination emerged in literature, supplanting the blank spaces on the globe with blank spaces inside the globe, the terra cava. Beginning with Symmes’s Theory of Concentric Spheres from 1818, dozens of American authors wrote fictions set in a hollow or semi- hollow earth. This setting provided a space for authors to experiment with contemporary issues of imperialism, science, faith, and socio-political reforms. The purpose of this thesis is one of literary archaeology, examining the American hollow earth narrative, which peaked in publication numbers between 1880 and 1920, most of which was forgotten as exploration of the Poles disproved Symmes’s theory of Polar openings into a hollow, habitable world. Though there have been some general studies of hollow earth and subterranean literature, there has never been a focused study of nineteenth century American hollow earth literature and its relationship to contemporary culture. The first chapter explores the history of John Cleves Symmes, Jr and his theory in the early nineteenth century, and the influence is had on American politics, literature, and scientific thought. In the subsequent three chapters, the terra cava narratives published between 1880 and 1920 are explored in three categories: the imperial, the spiritual, and the utopian. All of these elements reflect distinct American concerns during the fin de siècle about the country’s expansion, the closing of the frontier, variations in Christian theology, the development of Spiritualism, the women’s rights movement, and socio-economic reforms meant to improve American life. The primary texts are supported by contemporary reviews and analyses where any exist. As part of the conclusion, an extensive examination of the post-1920 terra cava narrative and the legacy of Symmes is provided, establishing the modern context for examining these historical literary works. 2 Contents Abstract 2 Acknowledgements 4 Declaration 5 Introduction 6 Chapter 1 – Symmes, Poe, and the Early Terra Cava 16 I. John Cleves Symmes, Jr. 16 II. Symzonia 25 III. The Apostles of Symmes 59 IV. Edgar Allan Poe and Jules Verne 65 Chapter 2 – Empire and the Resurgence of the American Terra Cava 69 I. Before 1880: Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Fear of American Empire 71 II. The Accidental Imperialist 75 III. The Intentional Imperialist 101 IV. The Young Imperialist 122 Chapter 3 – The Scientific Religion of Terra Cava 133 I. Christianity Inside the Earth 136 II. Spiritualism Inside the Earth 165 Chapter 4 – Finding Utopia in Terra Cava 186 I. The Feminist Utopia 187 II. The American Political Utopia 227 Conclusion – Terra Cava: A Coda 251 Appendix 267 Bibliography 270 3 Acknowledgements Foremost I must thank my supervisor, Professor David Seed, for his encouragement, insights, limitless patience, and willingness to read someone of the nineteenth century’s lesser accomplishments in literature. No PhD finds its way to completion without the support of family, and mine has been unfailing in their willingness to help: trips to archives, scanning old books, tracking down rare tomes, editing and more. So many thanks to my parents, my brother, my grandparents, and my uncle for all of their time and effort in helping me to achieve this goal. For my Postgrad crew: Chris, Maria, Leimar, Glyn, Dave, Emma, Bethan, Hannah, Lee, Natalie, Molly, Laura, Hana, Sophie, and Jane. You all were as much inspiration as necessary distraction. Whether I needed a word defined, a quote identified, a sympathetic ear, a paper reviewed, food to prevent scurvy, a pot of coffee, or a place to stay, you were all there. Thank you is not enough, but it will have to do for now. 4 Declaration This work is original and has not been submitted previously in support of any degree, qualification or course. Michelle K. Yost Liverpool, August 2013 5 Introduction LIGHT GIVES LIGHT, TO LIGHT DISCOVER -- "AD INFINITUM. ST. LOUIS, (Missouri Territory,) NORTH AMERICA, April 10, A. D. 1818. TO ALL THE WORLD! I declare the earth is hollow and habitable within; containing a number of solid concentrick spheres, one within the other, and that it is open at the poles 12 or 16 degrees; I pledge my life in support of this truth, and am ready to explore the hollow, if the world will support and aid me in the undertaking. Jno. Cleves Symmes. Of Ohio, Late Captain of Infantry. N. B. -- I have ready for the press, a Treatise on the Principles of Matter, wherein I show proofs of the above positions, account for various phenomena, and disclose Doctor Darwin's Golden Secret. My terms are the patronage of this and the new worlds. I dedicate to my Wife and her ten Children. I select Doctor S. L. Mitchill, Sir H. Davy, and Baron Alex. de Humboldt, as my protectors. I ask one hundred brave companions, well equipped, to start from Siberia in the fall season, with Reindeer and slays, on the ice of the frozen sea: I engage we find a warm and rich land, stocked with thrifty vegetables and animals if not men, on reaching one degree northward of latitude 82; we will return in the succeeding spring. J. C. S. In 1818, this short article, simply titled ‘Circular Number 1’, was disseminated across the United States and world by John Cleves Symmes, Jr., a former Captain in the US cavalry, a self-styled natural philosopher, and definitely not insane. This last element we know by virtue of the certificate included with Circular Number 1 to ensure that it would not be dismissed at the ravings of a lunatic.1 Though the idea of a hollow earth with concentric spheres had been in place since the late seventeenth century, and influenced earlier hollow earth narratives, the Symmes theory is unique for its influence on American science, politics and literature. Even those that did not believe in the Symmes theory or use it as a literary tool were influenced by the same storytelling techniques and inner earth constructs: the energised atmosphere, the lost race, the alteration of scale, prehistoric animals, and supernatural powers. What is meant by terra cava? I use this term to encompass the variety of ‘hollow earth’ writings that includes semi-hollow earth novels (those that employ vast caverns and 1 Peter Fitting, Subterranean Worlds: A Critical Anthology. (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2004), p. 95. 6 cave systems), interior concentric spheres, and the nineteenth century concept of a hollow earth open at the Poles. The Ptolemaic vision of stratified levels of existence is turned inward, moving from the heavens to inside the earth. What was once a realm of uncertainty and dread relayed in myth and religious teachings was turned, by science and imagination, into a new habitable world. Caves, chasms, mines, and other openings to space beneath the surface of the earth haunt human mythology in nearly every culture, and none of these ‘underworlds’ represents a pleasant realm. The gods, ghosts and ghouls which inhabit them are the stuff of nightmares, and not until the end of the seventeenth century would anyone begin to believe differently. Dante’s circles of hell do not ring so different from the theory of concentric spheres that Edmund Halley would propose a few centuries later. (Hell would later be relocated to other planes and other planets once it became more difficult to locate the centre of damnation inside the earth.) In 1665 Athanasius Kircher published Mundus Subterraneus, which envisioned the inside of the earth as a series of channels for water and fire, producing the first maps of the earth beneath the surface. In 1692 Edmund Halley proposed that the Earth was constructed of a series of concentric spheres beneath the surface. His reasoning for this stemmed from his work on Newton’s Principia, in which Newton had calculated the density of the moon to be significantly greater than the Earth’s: Now if the Moon be more solid than the Earth, as 9 to 5, why may we not reasonably suppose the Moon, being a small Body, and a Secondary Planet, to be solid Earth, Water and Stone and this Globe to consist of the same Materials, only four Ninths thereof to be Cavity, within and between the Internal Spheres; which I would render not improbable.2 Newton based these calculations on tidal powers of the Moon and Sun, but missed the mark fairly significantly.3 Because of this miscalculation, Halley felt the need to account for the Earth’s larger size yet smaller density, and a series of hollow, concentric spheres fit the bill. 2 Conway Zirkle, “The Theory of Concentric Spheres: Edmund Halley, Cotton Mather, John Cleves Symmes.” Isis (Vol. 37, No. 3/4, July 1947), p. 158. 3 Nick Kollerstrom, ‘The Hollow World of Edmund Halley’, Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol. 23 (August 1992), p. 185. 7 Into all of this Halley includes explanations for gravity, magnetism and hydrodynamics. The entire world system must be made cohesive in order to succeed as a scientific theory. Reverend Cotton Mather was a leading figure of protestant faith in America in the late-seventeenth and early-eighteenth centuries, and wrote one of the first scientific texts to appear in America, The Christian Philosopher (1721). In this he affirmed Halley’s theory and expands upon it to explain other natural phenomena, including compass variations and the atmosphere inside the earth.4 For Mather, nothing in this theory of world structure violated the tenets of his faith.