Many decades and countless summers ago the child that I was was enraptured with the stars. He spent the summer in Añón de Moncayo, a place where the celestial dome could be observed in all its magnificence. August nights in which the elders explained to us the meaning and significance of each of those points of light that adorned the night. Currently, luckily there is still a way to enjoy skies like those thanks to initiatives such as elnocturnario.com, where the approach to the stars could not be more genuine, precious and detailed.
Years later, when writing stories and novels occupied a large part of my free time, I wrote a story about the tears of San Lorenzo (Christian alias for the Perseids). The thing was about a magician who traveled to nineteenth-century Huesca at the festivities of his patron saint, San Lorenzo himself. Up to there he came with one of the most fascinating tricks in the world, which could only be performed on the night of August 15 by the work and grace of the playful Perseids. Someday maybe I'll upload it here.
That without forgetting my later «bilogy» of «El sueño del santo" next to "Esas estrellas que llueven» where the stellar has a fundamental weight to unravel the mystery of the plot.
Undoubtedly, astronomy gives a lot of play in fiction, but astronomy always surpasses any fantasy. Because as a science it feeds on great myths erected from the first human being who raised his head up with his mouth open to only assume and let himself be carried away by the imagination. The dawn of this science make up a fascinating mosaic peppered with its own brutal imagery.
Currently we can enjoy a multitude of books that guide us to know in detail the changing celestial dome, depending on the season and our position on the planet. It is only a matter of using the Internet search engine to find that example that explains everything from a primitive vision that can take us back to Kepler, further to Ptolemy or any other of the ancient cultures that offered their vision of the Universe.
If we start from a minimum and want to delve into that part of the cosmos to which human beings are currently capable of finding support and explanation, authors such as Eduardo Battaner They are busy spreading the astrophysics to make that dark space loaded with magical flashes less icy.
If we want to enjoy the mythological aspect that traces and even draws figures that occupy constellations or sets of stars, we can enjoy a multitude of books that delve into this mythology of the firmament.
If ours is a particular fixation with celestial bodies like the moon, not a few books present us with the two faces of our satellite. Because we already know that as part of the balance of our planet, the moon also has a lot to say.
And so one ends up getting a telescope to undertake the journey that the human being has been making for centuries with the same vision as a child in search, perhaps, of the most enlightening answers. Although it is clear that well documented one seems more like the cicerone of outer space than Ulysses lost among unknown oceans. Dare to know is always worth it.