Thursday, November 19, 2009

The Moon (1963)

Another book about the Moon. But what is special about this one is it's creative link to a much older space art book. In 1874, James Nasmyth and James Carpenter published, The Moon. A large and lavishly illustrated volume, its numerous plates were reproduction of photographs of plaster models of portions of the lunar surface, seen both telescopically from Earth and as they would appear to an observer on the Moon.
Brenna, Virgilio. Illustrated by Brenna, Virgilio. The Moon. New York: Golden Press. (104 p.) 29 cm.
In this unique book many of the pictures in it are also composites of paintings and photographs of a plaster model of the moon's surface. The text covers what is known about the Moon, the theories of formation, geography and geological processes. It has no illustrations of rockets or space flight but the picture/paintings of the Moon's surface are wonderful to see.


4 comments:

  1. Magnificent [desolation]! John, you wouldn't happen to have a larger version of that 1st interior image, would you? It seems to cry out to be stretched across the width of one's screen. (And if I rotated my monitor, the 2nd one would, too.)

    --Michael

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  2. When I was ten I got this book about the moon and kept it for years. I loved the pictures and all the images. At age 14 I still had the book-but at that time man actually got to the moon.:-)

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  3. A seminal book for young readers about lunar science as it was in 1963. Visually,the book was an inspiration and spurred my own interest in space science--meteorites and tekties, and eventual work as a NASA science writer; plus my own 2006 book about the Moon ("Inconstant Moon"). Good science books can indeed have profound influences on young minds and can lead to science careers.

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