ONCE upon a time, when I was a professional astronomer, I enjoyed a stint at a big telescope in the southern hemisphere. During an observing break, I went outside with colleagues and, with the aid of a star map, we began searching the sky for the Large Magellanic Cloud. When we found it, we cringed with embarrassment: this satellite galaxy of our Milky Way was a huge smudge, about six times the apparent size of the moon.
I use this example to illustrate how professional astronomers, reliant on software to steer their telescopes, can be poor at finding their way around the night sky. Despite knowing how stars work, they may have little clue how to locate them. Well, they could do a lot worse than arm themselves with A Down to Earth Guide to the Cosmos.
“Professional astronomers know how stars work, but may have little clue how to locate them”
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Mark Thompson, astronomer on the BBC’s The One Show and Stargazing Live, has written an admirably clear and concise guide to the wonders of the night sky, which will give anyone with a hankering to rise above the humdrum a toehold in the heavens. Thompson deals with the nuts and bolts of how to read a star map depending on your latitude and the time of year. He weaves in a clear history of astronomy and an overview of modern astrophysics – so when you have found the stars you are looking for, you know how they work. From black holes to brown dwarfs, Neptune to neutron stars, pulsars to the Pole Star, it’s all here.
“The real beauty of astronomy,” says Thompson, “is that it is free and open to anyone.” This is a book to get people started, whether keen amateurs or clueless professionals.
A Down to Earth Guide to the Cosmos
Bantam Press