The
mystery of Tökland Island is one of the best-known novels of the Spanish
writer Joan Manuel Gisbert, which in 1980 won him the Lazarillo Award.
In the first part of the book, a millionaire is trying to find the
right person, who in the second part should help him unveil a tremendous
secret, and so he builds an underground labyrinth in the depths of the
fictional Tökland Island, offering a grand prize to the person who will manage
to solve all the problems posed by the successive rooms of the maze.
At first, all who try to solve the challenge posed by the maze fail
ignominiously. At last, the protagonist of the novel decides to attempt the
adventure, but as he does not trust himself to solve every problem alone, he
prepares a team of collaborators, specialists in various fields, who will
contact him from a ship that will remain close to the island, and while he goes
through the labyrinth will help him solve the problems he finds there.
To communicate secretly with the ship, the protagonist is provided with
a tiny radio transmitter inserted into a false tooth, which works by making it
collide with the opposite tooth, thus allowing him to send Morse coded messages
to the ship, explaining each problem that he must solve. The team of
collaborators sends him the solution to the problem by means of a radio
message, which he receives in a receiver-earpiece hidden in one of his external
auditory conduits. With this help, the protagonist solves all the problems of
the labyrinth, receives the promised prize and goes on to face the true
mystery, which makes the second part of the book.
What is the scientific mistake of this novel? Quite simply, that the
ingenious procedure used by the protagonist to communicate with his
collaborators wouldn’t have worked. Why? Because radio waves cannot cross the ground,
so they wouldn’t reach the depths of the maze. In fact, they also wouldn’t pass
through water, which they’d need to do if a part of the labyrinth were located
below sea level.
It is easy to verify that radio waves cannot go through the ground.
Just enter a tunnel with a car, with the radio on. While the car is inside the
tunnel, you’ll notice that the radio just produces noise. As soon as the car leaves
the tunnel, the radio works again.
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| Joan Manuel Gisbert |
Similarly, in the subway tunnels there was no coverage for mobile
phones until repeaters connected outside by means of cables were introduced.
This system would not be feasible in the labyrinth of Tökland Island, as it
would require performing works that couldn’t be done in secret. Consequently,
the trick used by the protagonist wouldn’t have worked in real life.
We all know that radar, which uses radio waves, does not work in water
or through the ground, just in air and space. To get a similar effect on water,
sonar is used, which rather than electromagnetic waves uses acoustic waves.
Could sound waves have been used on Tökland Island? The answer is negative
for two reasons: on the one hand, the acoustic receivers and transmitters
couldn’t have been miniaturized as much as the radio, and therefore wouldn’t
have been hidden; on the other, the acoustic waves sent in both directions
would have had to pass through the air of the labyrinth, much less suitable for
their transmission than water and earth. Therefore, this solution should be
discarded.
In any case, although the procedure used by the protagonist wouldn’t
have worked in practice, this novel can be read with interest and hooks the
reader, at least during this first part we have just reviewed.
The same post in Spanish
Thematic Thread on Literature and Cinema: Previous Next
Manuel Alfonseca
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