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<\/figure>\n\nWhen I was young, I was given a copy of HA Rey\u2019s beautiful book The <\/em>Stars: <\/em>A <\/em>New <\/em>Way <\/em>to <\/em>See <\/em>Them. <\/em>First published 70 years ago, it is as far as I know the only title in print with a cover endorsement by Albert Einstein. Rey\u2019s love for stargazing and his talent for creative illustration resulted in something special \u2013a timeless classic at once both traditional and progressive. It also popularised new, more accessible designs for the ancient star patterns of the constellations. Rey\u2019s book was published several years before The <\/em>Sky <\/em>at <\/em>Night <\/em>first appeared on our screens, and much has changed in the world of astronomy. But what about the way we interpret the stars?<\/p>\n\n Why is it that, in the age of the James Webb Space Telescope and other high-tech astrophysical observatories, we still find ourselves unable to let go of the constellations? Granted, for a century they have been formalised by astronomers to compartmentalise the sky with international agreement. Yet their varying sizes and boundaries are arbitrary, and with our precise celestial coordinate system we could simply discard them \u2013 if we wanted to. Instead, we hold onto them, not out of an academic need, but rather a sentimental one: they are a part of who we are.<\/p>\n\n Across the ages, the night sky has engendered inspiration. Our ancestors filled it with stories and translated its incorporeal quality through millennia of poetry, visual arts and music. Debussy made moonlight sing; Van Gogh made starlight dance; and on countless unrecorded occasions, lonely seafarers conversed with the tapestry of heroes and creatures gazing back down at them, introduced to them by their elders. Once drenched in mythology, now scrutinised with technology, the night sky has lost some of its mystery but none of its magic, as storytelling remains at the heart of astronomy.<\/p>\n\n Today we tell scientific stories about the earliest moments of cosmic history, of black holes and alien worlds. Our new stories are grand and yet also intimate, connecting our lives directly to the extraordinary lives of stars through the very atoms we are made of. Still, the constellations continue to enchant novice stargazers; the themes in their mythological tales are less relevant to us today, but the characters are no less diverse and fascinating.<\/span><\/p>\n\n In my career I\u2019ve had the pleasure of introducing the constellations to very young students, whose imaginations are well prepared to bring them to life. But I\u2019ve also longed to modernise those characters to reflect the stories we tell about the Universe today. So I\u2019ve created a new star lore in which the creatures among the constellations take on new roles: Cygnus, the Swan is no longer a disguise for Zeus, but rather a brilliant astrophysicist.<\/p>\n\n She delights in answering the questions of an inquisitive Greenwich Park squirrel who longs to understand the stars. These stories are about the importance of curiosity, patient teaching, and contemplation of the natural world. And in the spirit of HA Rey, their re-invention invites accessibility but leaves the patterns intact. After all, as we shared the constellations with the stargazers of the past, so we leave them for the stargazers of the future.<\/p>\n\n
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