Levesque tells tales of those who gaze at the stars

(Photo: Auntie’s Bookstore)

As I awoke on this day after the 2020 presidential election, I found myself thinking of the greater universe. I can’t imagine why.

Thing is, like most kids, I used to spend hours looking up at the sky at night, wondering what was out there. And where I fit into all this … space.

Turns out, duh, I wasn’t the only one.

Emily Levesque is an associate professor of astronomy at the University of Washington. She is the author of “The Last Stargazers: The Enduring Story of Astronomy’s Vanishing Explorers.”

As such, Levesque will be the subject of a 7 p.m. Zoom event on Saturday. Look for a link to the event that will be posted Saturday on the Auntie’s Bookstore website.

Not to get too technical, but – according to her UW web page – Levesque’s “research interests are focused on massive stellar astrophysics and the use of massive stars as cosmological tools.”

In an interview with UW News , Levesque said that she began writing this book after authoring several astronomy textbooks.

“I just realized that I want to write this book now,” she said, “I don’t want this to be a thing that I put off forever,” adding that when she began focusing “the ideas just started appearing in my head and coming out of my mouth at the same time – it was unreal.”

Those ideas involve a range of anecdotes, from lightning strikes, earthquakes and volcanoes, the occasional bear or jumping spider, all of which those attempting to study the stars have encountered.

She even includes the tale of the Texas guy who, fed up with his bosses, shot up ab observatory and took a hammer to the telescope itself.

“These are stories astronomers tell each other when all of us are hanging out at meetings,” Levesque said. “Like: ‘Did I ever tell you about this wacky thing that happened to me at a telescope?’ Tall tales of the field.”

Let’s hope she elaborates more on Saturday. We could all use a bit of levity back down here on Earth.