Travels into Yourself

Tag Area: Time Travel Trope
Play

If

  • by Lord Dunsany
  • at the Ambassadors’ Theatre (London, 30 May 1921)

John Beal, a London businessman, is given a magic crystal that allows him to go back in time and change one act; he is happy with his current life, so he decides to merely go back to catch a train that he was annoyed about missing ten years ago—but the resulting changes are more than he ever expected.

This is the earliest story that I’ve seen where the hero goes back into his earlier body and relives something differently. Some of the later stories of this kind have no actual time travel, but merely give knowledge of an alternate timeline (e.g., Asimov’s “What If?”); others live out the two timelines in parallel (e.g., the 1998 movie Sliding Doors, also set in motion by a missed/caught train); and some, like If, are couched in terms of time travel (e.g., the 1986 movie Peggy Sue Got Married). —Michael Main
He that taketh this crystal, so, in his hand, at night, and wishes, saying ‘At a certain hour let it be’; the hour comes and he will go back eight, ten, even twelve years if he will, into the past, and do a thing again, or act otherwise than he did. The day passes; the ten years are accomplished once again; he is here once more; but he is what he might have become had he done that one thing otherwise.
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  • Fantasy
  • Comedy
  • Definite Time Travel
Novella

He Never Slept


The famous Dr. Jason Veldor has made a potion that eliminates the need for sleep. The only trouble is, it’s devastatingly addictive, and for better or worse, it takes Veldor’s mind into the lives in other times and other dimensions. —Michael Main
To come to my point, Richard, I have for many years been very disgusted with the fact that all the human race—indeed every living organism—must waste a third of its life in sleep. Think what a race we’d be if we never slept!
No image currently available.
  • Science Fiction
  • Debatable Time Travel
Short Story

The Circle of Zero


In Professor Aurora de Néant’s odd logic, everything that’s occurring now has already happened many times before in the endless eternity of the past. So, if you want to know the future, all you need to do is call up your memories of the past. A crazy idea, perhaps, but shortly after the crash of ’29, de Néant, his daughter Yvonne, and his former student Jack Anders have nothing to lose in trying to predict their future. —Michael Main
In eternity, the Law of Chance functions perfectly. In eternity, sooner or later, every possible combinaton of things and events must happen. Must happen, if it’s a possible combination. I say, therefore, that in eterminty, whatever can happen will happen!
No image currently available.
  • Undetermined
  • Debatable Time Travel
Feature Film

Repeat Performance


After Sheila Page kills her husband in a fit of passion on New Year’s Eve, she wishes nothing other than to have the entire year back—if destiny will only let her. —Michael Main
How many times have you said, “I wish I could live this year over again?” This is the story of a woman who did relive one year of her life.
A determined Joan Leslie, dressed in a shoulderless evening gown, holds a
                smoking gun.
  • Fantasy
  • Mystery and Crime
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Journey into Mystery #42

Life Sentence!


Leo Sampsom is a four-time thief serving a life sentence. So what has he got to lose when a strange man offers him a pill that will put him back into his own body right before his last theft? —Michael Main
But what if those pills really work? I’d be out of prison . . . free, back twenty years!
No image currently available.
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Short Story

Journey into Mystery #45

Look to the Future


Now that Ben Jaremy is the last of the Jaremys, he finds himself reluctant to sell the family farm that he left forty years ago. —Michael Main
There is no money . . . just the house. As the last of the Jaremys, it’s your duty.
No image currently available.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Journey into Mystery #45

What Happened to Harrison


Harrison bets his academics reputation on being able to show that his rival’s claim of sending a man’s subconscious back in time is hooey. —Michael Main
Keep your voice down, Harrison! You might wake Martin, and that would be dangerous! It would alter the past!
No image currently available.
  • Science Fiction
  • Weird Fiction
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Comic Book

Unusual Tales #11

Second Chance


After Dr. Paul Faine accomplishes his life’s work, he begins to reflect on the past and whether the world is ready for limitless power. —Michael Main
Now we will see into the coree of the atom . . . the core which is the basis of all things! We will be able to produce life in the test tube, blow up the world with the touch of a finger!
In three large panels, a white-haired scientist examines something through a
                large microscope.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Novelette

Passage to Gomorrah


In a future of FTL spaceships, time storms between the stars, and male-only space explorers, young Berenice had run away to the stars as a sex worker. But when she inexplicably becomes pregnant, the powers-that-be book passage for her on Captain Cross’s ship to the exhile planet called Gomorrah. —Michael Main
“But wouldn’t our objective reality be affected?”

He nodded. “It could be,” he said, “since, in the absence of any real passage of time, it would be in temporal ratio to our involvement in our pasts, which might force it into a different time plane altogether.”
Pen-and-ink drawing of a man in a whirlwind falling toward a nude woman with
                outstretched arms.
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Novella

Unsound Variations


Peter Norten and his wife Kathy already had a rocky marriage before heading up to Bruce Bunnish’s Colorado mansion for a ten-year reunion with Bruce and two other members of the Northwestern University B Team that Peter captained to a near-win at the North American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championship. But will Peter and Kathy’s marriage survive the trip, and just how did Bruce end up as the only member of the team to go on to success? —Michael Main
Time is said to be the fourth dimension, but it differs from the other three in one conspicuous way—our consciousness moves along it. From past to present only, alas. Time itselfdoes not flow, no more than, say, width can flow. Our minds flicker from one instant of time to the next. This analogy was my starting point. I reasoned that if consciousness can move in one direction, it can move in the other direction as well. It took me fifty years to work out the details, however, and make what I call a flashback possible.
A blue-skinned, bikini-clad, sword-wielding woman flies over a forest on the
                neck of a dragon.
  • Eloi Bronze Medal
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Feature Film

Peggy Sue Got Married


Middle-aged Peggy Sue has two grown children and an adulterous husband whom she married at 18, so will she do things the same when she finds herself back in 1960 in her senior year of high school? —Michael Main
Well, Mr Snelgrove, I happen to know that in the future I will not have the slightest use for algebra, and I speak from experience.
Holding an old-fashioned key, Kathleen Turner (as Peggy Sue) looks eagerly
                through a giant keyhole.
  • Eloi Gold Medal
  • Fantasy
  • Definite Time Travel
Feature Film

Future Past


While working at his extravagant computer, computer whiz-kid Harlan, comes into contact with a group from the future including a fairly absurd professor. What happens is that a young man comes from the future back to the present and appears to be Harlan's grown self—a self-centred and smug exploitive man. The two clash while the professor tries to get the old Harlan back to the future. —based on Peter Malone’s film reviews
Title card from the movie Future Past, in a green, computer-readable font.
  • Science Fiction
  • Audience: Young Adults
  • Definite Time Travel
Feature Film

13 Going On 30


Everything that could go wrong is going wrong for 13-year-old Jenna Rink. If only she could be already grown up in the future! —Michael Main
I wanna be thirty and flirty and thriving.
Jennifer Garner (as adult Jenna Rink) stands tall in a polka dot summer dress,
                with skirt blowing in the wind, holding a child
  • Eloi Honorable Mention
  • Fantasy
  • Romance
  • Comedy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Short Story

Time’s Arrow


A physicist with a dead girlfriend experiences various precognition episodes leading up to his attempt to travel to the past to undead the girlfriend, or at least plant the seeds for the precognition. —Michael Main
I’m certain I didn’t send myself any mail recently, but then again, I have plans to do so in the near future—or near past, I suppose.
Text from "Time
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Feature Film

Hot Tub Time Machine


Three middle-aged losers (along with a nephew) head back to their teenaged bodies at a ski resort twentysome years earlier. —Michael Main
Yes, exactly. You step on a bug and the fucking Internet is never invented.
An equation! Old mug shots of the four cast members plus alcohol plus squirrel
                equals young mug shots and a hot tub.
  • Science Fiction
  • Comedy
  • Definite Time Travel
Novel

Anna Green 1

Time between Us


Somewhat self-absorbed 16-year-old Anna Green manages to fall for the first time traveler she ever meets, not realizing that he’s a time traveler or that he’s hoping his mission to 1995 will be a short-term affair. —Jeff Delgado
It’s too easy for me to say the wrong thing today, and if I do, we may never meet at all
A teenage girl looks into the distance on a beach with her arms clutched around
                her waist.
  • Romance
  • Audience: Young Adults
  • Definite Time Travel
Short Film

A Time Travel Short

  • written and directed by Antonette Ho
  • 3-part serial (Youtube: Antonette H Channel, 4 November 2015) to 17 January 2016)

A mysterious box allows Linda to travel back in time for five minutes at each go, so she starts out by taking five minutes at age 14 to stand up to a bully who’s harrassing a friend. —Michael Main
Rule 3: Owner will be sent back to the present after 5 minutes are up.
Wide-eyed Gwyneth Shum (as the young woman, Linda) opens a small wooden box
                that shines a bright light on her face.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Cartoon

Arthur (s20e01a)

Buster’s Second Chance


According to Brain, the past cannot be changed, but Buster still tries to do so when he’s thrown back to preschool by a time vortex. —Manachu
Buster: What’s the square root of 49? [Buster thinks] I don’t know. I don’t know! . . . I’m baaaaack!
An animated white rabbit wearing rectangular red glasses looks shocked to be
                falling into a green-and-white vortex.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: Children
  • Definite Time Travel
Miniseries

Somewhere Between


After San Francisco suffers a week of terror at the hands of a serial killer ending with the death of Laura Price’s eight-year-old daughter Serena, Laura falls into a dark depression and attempts suicide. Next thing she knows, she’s waking up before that week, whereupon she teams up with ex-police detective Nico Jackson (who also got thrown back in time), hoping to change the week, catch the killer, save Nico’s brother’s life, and save Serena—all in a mere nine additional episodes. —Michael Main
I’m not going to let anybody hurt you this time. I swear to you on my life.
A black-and-white sideways head shot of Paula Patton (as Laura Price) above the
                title of "Somewhere Between".
  • Fantasy
  • Mystery and Crime
  • Definite Time Travel
Short Story

Ugo


At age six, Ugo began leaping into other parts of his life: sometimes into an older Ugo, sometimes younger, sometimes in control of his body, sometimes just observing. The whole leaping business isn’t entirely clear except fo his connection with his future wife Cynthia—or sometimes Ciznia—and his insistence that nothing he sees can ever be changed. —Michael Main
Later on, Ugo developed a theory about it. He said that in reality everybody Leaps all the time. The proof? Déjà vu. The feeling of having already experienced what is in fact happening for the first time was for him the ultimate, definitive evidence of Leaping. The only difference between Ugo and everyone else was that he remembered, while we don’t.
An old woman in I red robe stands among waves and flying fish.
  • Fantasy
  • Mainstream
  • Debatable Time Travel
Feature Film

Time Freak

  • written and directed by Andrew Bowler
  • (at movie theaters, Phillipines, 7 November 2018)

When Debbie breaks up with often-clueless physics genius Stillwell, he does the normal thing and invents a time machine for him and his friend to go back and fix every wayward relationship moment. —Michael Main
I just love the proofs and the equations and the whole riddle of it all.
Asa Butterfield and Sophie Turner stand nose-to-nose with their eyes closed
                with light drops falling around them.
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Miniseries

Il était une seconde fois


At first, Vincent’s only plan for the mysterious 600mm wooden cube that provides a tunnel to the past is to make sure that Louise doesn’t break up with him four months in the past, but new circumstances soon raise the stakes. Then it gets weird in this four-part miniseries. —Michael Main
En fait, je suis passé dans un cube, et ça . . .
translate I actually went through this cube, and it . . .
Freya Mavor (as Louise) sleeps peacefully in the arms of wide-awake Gaspard
                Ulliel (as Vincent).
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Novel

Again, but Better


Shy Shane Primaveri heads to London for a semester abroad for a semester abroad program in creative writing where she hopes to become more outgoing, kiss a boy that she likes, and convince her parents after-the-fact that her decision to explore paths outside of a pre-med major was the right one. But things don’t go exactly as planned the first time through the semester. —Michael Main
Could the elevator have been, like, a time machine?
Drawing of a young woman with long reddish hair, strolling from a white area
                into pastal blue with the London skyline in the background.
  • Fantasy
  • Romance
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Novel

The Midnight Library

  • by Matt Haig
  • (Canongate Books, August 2020)

After thirty-something Nora Seed kills herself, she arrives as a possibly metaphorical library with an infinite number of books containing her possible lives, each one of which she may try out, always starting on the night of her suicide.

For me, the depiction of Nora’s suicidal ideation and eventual killing of herself were dismissive of those who face depression every day, and the outcome was fictionally romanticized in a way that may induce suicide rather than showing understanding and encouragement to seek out help when life is dark. I don’t see this as intentional by the author. —Michael Main
“Every life contains many millions of decisions. Some big, some small. But every time one decision is taken over another, the outcomes differ. An irreversible variation occurs, which in turn leads to further variations. These books are portals to all the lives you could be living.”
A stylized, four-story, white library with a silhouette of a cat and text to
                the side stating, "One library. Infinite lives."
  • Fantasy
  • Debatable Time Travel
Feature Film

An Hour

  • written and directed by Prasanth Kumar
  • (Youtube: Andhra Pradesh Channel, 2 October 2020)

Young, unemployed Nanna seems to take everything in stride, even the arrival of unexpected package containing an artistic hourglass with the power to take him back or forward one hour in time.

The audio is mostly Telugu, but there are subtitles in broken English. —Michael Main
An old clock with ornate hands and Roman numerals shows behind the words "An
                hour".
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
Novel

Annie and the Wolves


Historical research Ruth McClintock and local high school student Reece have a journal written by Annie Oakley, from which they conclude that Annie was a time traveler to traumatic moments in her own life—a power that Ruth seems to share. —Michael Main
Reece, it isn’t just clarvoyance or neurosis, either.
She’d tell him in person, the thing they should have come out and admitted from the start.
It’s time travel.
Photograph of Annie Oakley shooting backwards over her shoulder while looking
                in a hand mirror.
  • Fantasy
  • Definite Time Travel
Flash Fiction

Giving Up the Ghost


An assassin jumps back into her 17-year-old body where she takes care of her mission and has a little time left over. —Michael Main
My target is a few blocks from here, which is why the Department of Temporal Enforcement chose me for the assignment. Proximity is important. The less you move around, the less likely the time stream gets fucked up.
Yellow steam rises from two coffee cups into an abstract outer space design and
                brown background.
  • Science Fiction
  • Definite Time Travel
TV Episode

Fantasy Island (v3s01e05)

Twice in a Lifetime


The Island takes Nisha into two different versions of her future life in order to help her decide which man to marry. Only the Island knows whether Nisha is actually time traveling or merely experiencing potential futures, but the story’s ending suggests the latter. And meanwhile, out in the Island wilderness, Elena and Javier share intimate moments. —Michael Main
Let the future unfold.
John Gabriel Rodriquez (as Javier with a five-o
  • Fantasy
  • Debatable Time Travel
TV Series

De Volta aos 15

  • Back to 15
  • Back to 15
  • written and directed by multiple people
  • 3 seasons (Netflix, 25 February 2022 to 24 February 2024)

Thirty-yeasr-old Anita feels that her life is a failure. If only she could do things over again, starting with that miserable first day of high school at age 15. In the case of the six-episode first season, Anita travels back-and-forth multiple times, with each round of new-found self-assertiveness and fresh mistakes at age 15 creating a new life at age 30. In Season 2, she gains a traveling companion in 17-year-old Joel. —Michael Main
Que vontade de pedir desculpes pra você.
translate If I could press undo in real life, I would do everything differently.
No image currently available.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: Young Adults
  • Definite Time Travel
Novel

This Time Tomorrow


After turning forty in a snit because of her career decisions, her unexciting boyfriend, and her dying father, Alice Stern wakes up on her 16th birthday in her teen body. —Michael Main
“I know it’s your birthday,” Leonard said. “You’ve made me watch Sixteen Candles enough times to ensure that I wouldn’t let this one slide.”
A light brown scribble winds its way around a lighter brown cover of Straub’s
                novel, This Time Tomorrow.
  • Fantasy
  • Audience: YA and Up
  • Definite Time Travel
Flash Fiction

Slight Courage


A woman moves back and forth through her own life, processing her mother’s death. —Michael Main
Why do you have to leave me? Why now? Her lips move, a gentle separation, but hold a wordless tenure.
Stylized outline of a rocket launching in a green circular seal for
                Daily Science Fiction.
  • Fantasy
  • Definite Time Travel
Feature Film

The Greatest Hits

  • written and directed by Ned Benson
  • (South by Southwest Film Festival, 14 March 2024)

No image currently available.
  • Silver Medal Eloi
  • Romance
  • Music and Musicals
  • Definite Time Travel