Elijah and his fiery chariot

The choir of which I am currently chairman, East Malling Singers, will perform Mendelssohn's splendid oratorio Elijah at the Church of St James the Great, East Malling, Kent, on Saturday June 30. We will be joined by four vocal soloists, many guest choral singers and a full concert orchestra, conducted by our music director, Benjamin Rous. Rehearsal will start at 11.15am and the concert will start at 7.30pm. It promises to be an exciting, if exhausting day.

I mention this event here because the biblical text of one part of Elijah - No. 38 - was part of the inspiration for the name of this weblog:

"Then did Elijah the prophet break forth like a fire; his words appeared like burning torches. Mighty kings by him were overthrown. He stood on the mount of Sinai, and heard the judgments of the future; and in Horeb, its vengeance. And when the Lord would take him away to heaven, lo! there came a fiery chariot, with fiery horses; and he went by a whirlwind to heaven."



Another factor in choosing the name Fiery Chariot was my fascination by powerful jet aircraft and rockets, the most astonishing of which, in terms of sheer size, weight, power and speed, was the Saturn V launch vehicle, a gigantic 3-stage rocket, employed in the United States' 1960s/1970s Apollo Project for landing men on the moon and bringing them back safely. At launch the Saturn V was 110 metres high, 10 metres diameter, 3,000 tonnes weight, over 4,000 tonnes thrust; and ultimately it had a 40,000 km/hr maximum speed in space. Mind boggling? Well, in English money that's as high as St Paul's Cathedral, as wide as a 3-line motorway carriageway, as heavy as 2,000 large cars, 60 times more powerful and noisy than Concorde at take off; and at maximum speed an equivalent journey time for London to Paris of about 35 seconds! OK, it's still mind boggling. It's also the ultimate fiery chariot. Photos and videos simply cannot convey its audacity but, for the record:




After my little digression, back to Mendelssohn's Elijah. First, the composer:

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn was born in Leipzig in 1809, the grandson of a famous Jewish philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn, and the son of a banker. The family took the name 'Bartholdy' when they converted from Judaism to Christianity, but Felix insisted on keeping both names. He belonged to the class of educated people in easy circumstances: his musical genius was quickly recognised and encouraged - before he was 15 he had written as many symphonies and an opera, all of which were discarded! In his early twenties, Mendelssohn travelled the world becoming a great favourite in England. He had a penchant for making and keeping friends, among them Queen Victoria, and in rehearsals he was described as being modest and charming, with unfailing tact and politeness. As Director of Music at Düsseldorf and in Leipzig, with its famous Gewandhaus concerts, Mendelssohn was influenced in his composing by Handel and Bach, and their musical styles are evident in Elijah.

Mendelssohn can be said to be a classical Romantic composer in that he used the classical forms, but belonged, with Liszt, Berlioz and Chopin, to the composers of the new music coming from Europe with its exciting virtuosity and exotic harmonies. His appeal to the English was the result of a number of circumstances. England's new concert halls, fulfilling the Victorian philosophy of moral and social improvement for the middle and working classes, were built to house large choral concerts usually accompanied by the organ, and could satisfy the Victorian's love of contrasts in volume and sound. But music and morals were closely tied in Victorian England. Here the oratorio came into its own - a drama, usually based on a Biblical or other sacred subject, but without the limitations of an operatic staging. It could, therefore, have an epic or contemplative breadth not possible in an opera and could be staged in the new concert halls around the country.

So, when Mendelssohn stood on the rostrum of Birmingham Town Hall on 26 August 1846 to conduct the first performance of Elijah, success was assured. The Times wrote: "Never was there a more complete triumph". From the daring harmonies of Thanks be to God to the anger of the mob in Woe to him, the audience enjoyed the 500 voices and the mighty organ, happy in the knowledge that they were improving their minds and their morals!

Mendelssohn's death followed shortly afterwards. He returned to England the following year with a revised Elijah and gave four performances. But he had been shocked and depressed by the death of his older sister Fanny and in October 1847 was himself dead at the age of 38.

(EMS programme notes courtesy of Christine Hide of Daventry Choral Society)


Some more video excerpts:

Introduction: 'As God the Lord of Israel liveth, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word'
Overture
No. 1: 'Help, Lord! wilt Thou quite destroy us?'

Oh, by the way, this performance is sung in Korean, but don't let that put you off. They're very good. And anyway, there are subtitles. (These are in Korean also, but don't let that put you off either).



These South Koreans like to take this work at a good pace, as can be seen and heard with No. 29, 'He watching over Israel slumbers not nor sleeps'. Well, at this speed he wouldn't:



Now for a piece of history. Ernest Lough sings 'Hear ye, Israel!', the aria which launches the Second Part of Elijah. As you will hear, this was a 'scratch' performance given when Lough was aged 16 (although he sounds more like he was half that age):



And a 'moving' performance by the accompanist's page turner:



Anyone wanting more of the same need only explore


Here's the story of Elijah:

As told in the Old Testament (1 and 2 Kings), Elijah is characterised as a stern, unyielding prophet of God called to lead the Israelite people back to worship of their one true God. He has a pivotal role in acting between the true, just God and the Israelites, called to serve God as His loyal interpreter to a fickle and wayward people. They are swayed first one way in response to God's miracles and then the other by Queen Jezebel as she incites them to crowd violence. The mainspring of the drama is the tension between the Israelites and Elijah: a series of powerfully dramatic choral movements convey the role of the population while Elijah's response to them is vividly portrayed in his three main arias - his opposition to them (Lord God of Abraham), his winning back of the people's trust (Is not His word like a fire) and his desertion by them (It is enough). Mendelssohn's music shows his effective use of the dramatic Handelian sweep of the oratorio, interpolated with Bachian-style meditations on the story.

Elijah takes centre stage from the beginning, calling down a drought upon the land as punishment for the people's deserting the true God and worshipping Baal. (Queen Jezebel had brought her heathen Baal gods with her to Israel and King Ahab had allowed their infiltration into the people's beliefs and worship.) The theme of drought and God's ultimate sending of rain takes up the first half of the oratorio, with two side plots in which God shows his mercy and his power. He shows his care by bringing back to life the widow's son and promising that her food supply will not run out. He provides dramatic evidence of his power to the Israelites in the contest on Mount Carmel between God and the prophets of Baal. The first half of the oratorio ends with the crowd acknowledging God's mercy and omnipotence.

The second part opens with God's words of reassurance to his people. Then Elijah confronts King Ahab. This gives Jezebel the chance to incite the people against Elijah and Elijah despairs of his mission. Angelic care and his witnessing the glory of the Lord at Mount Horeb restore his courage. The people describe the vigour with which Elijah returns to proclaim God's power and the miraculous consummation of his life as he is taken up into heaven in a 'fiery chariot'. Mendelssohn sees Elijah's life in its scriptural context as the forerunner of the Messiah, and in the final chorus he looks to the completion of Elijah's mission in the coming of the Christ.

(EMS programme notes courtesy of Christine Hide of Daventry Choral Society)


Here are some fiery chariot paintings (I couldn't find any featuring the Saturn V):

Ascension of Elijah by Juan de Valdés Leal

Information found here

Elijah Taken up in a Chariot of Fire by Giovanni Battista

Russian Icon: The Prophet Elijah and the Fiery Chariot

Russian icon: The Fiery Ascension of Elijah the Prophet - Northern School

Russian icon of unknown name - Novgorodian 16th century

For further information on these last two paintings take a look at The Fiery Ascension of Elijah the Prophet

For a comprehensive collection of Elijah paintings you cannot do better than look at The Elijah Project


Finally, the Overture from Elijah fits remarkably well over this Flight to the Ford scene from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. Both the audio and the video are completely un-cut. It was a miraculous coincidence the way the music fit the video.

J. M. Barrie and George Meredith

J. M. Barrie, the Scottish author and playwright, died on June 19, 1937.

Today, 70 years later, perhaps a handful of people will write something in commemoration of his death. For my part, I should like to show you a place which was very special to Barrie from the age of 25, and to give you part of his memoir on it, including a piece which he wrote in commemoration of the passing of one of his literary friends, the English poet and novelist, George Meredith. Were it not for Meredith, Barrie might never have visited Box Hill, in Surrey.

Composite picture of Barrie and Meredith

From an early age, Barrie had been a great admirer of Meredith, perhaps his greatest. In 1886, when still a London-based journalist for the St James's Gazette, his employer, Frederick Greenwood, instructed him to visit Meredith at his home on Box Hill and write an article about him; that visit was to spark a mutual friendship which lasted until Meredith's death 23 years later, and Barrie was to pay many visits to Flint Cottage. In fact, Barrie had already been there of his own accord about a year earlier, as he explained, writing in the third person, in 1930 in The Greenwood Hat, Being A Memoir Of James Anon 1885-1887:

'He [Meredith] was royalty at its most august to Anon [Barrie], whose very first railway journey on coming to London was to Box Hill to gaze at the shrine' 'There is a grassy bank, or there was (for I go there no more), opposite the gate, and the little royal residence is only some twenty yards away. Even to Anon that day it seemed small but very royal. He sat on the grassy bank and quivered. Presently he saw a face at the window of a little sitting-room he was to be very familiar with in the hereafter. He knew whose face it was. Then the figure stood in the doorway, an amazing handsome man in grey clothes and a red necktie. He came slowly down the path towards the gate. It was too awful for Anon. He ran away'. 'Something I wrote made him ask me to visit him, and after that I was often at Flint Cottage for stretches of time until he died in 1909. I loved this man more every time I saw him. The last time, when he was very frail, I said I thought he had a better colour, and he replied with a smile, 'Yes, a pretty green.'

Green, the healthy kind, is all around Flint Cottage. Trees of many species, including rare box trees (after which Box Hill was named), stand on the upper levels of the expansive, steeply sloping hills here. Low-growing grasses and herbs bedeck the downland much of which is grazed by sheep. I'm very pleased to say that Barrie's 'grassy bank' remains intact and ungrazed to this day. Not only that, but also it is now marked on the local National Trust map as 'Barrie's Bank', and its survival well into the future seems assured. Situated on the lower slopes of the North Downs it supports typical chalk downland flora and fauna, and to sit knowingly on this bank, among the orchids, the bees and Chalkhill Blue butterflies, is to wear Barrie's suit for a while – the suit of a young writer who has yet to make his name as an author and playwright.

Extract of The National Trust's current map of Box Hill

Barrie's Bank

Barrie's Bank
View from the road outside entrance to Flint Cottage

Flint Cottage
Barrie's seated view of 'the shrine' perhaps?

Flora on Barrie's Bank in June

Meredith moved to Flint Cottage in 1867. He lived there with his second wife, Marie, and their children, and he entertained many visitors, including George Gissing, Henry James, Robert Louis Stevenson and, of course, James Barrie; and the critic and caricaturist Max Beerbohm lived there for a time during the Second World War.

Flint Cottage still retains its 'round'

George Meredith loved nature and kept fit by walking the Surrey countryside regularly, usually with his dogs. He probably knew every inch of Box Hill and every tree thereon: 'I am every morning at the top of Box Hill - as its flower, its bird, its prophet. I drop down the moon on one side, I draw up the sun on t'other. I breathe fine air. I shout ha ha to the gates of the world. Then I descend and know myself a donkey for doing it.' Meredith kept a donkey, named Picnic, which had its own shed.

Picnic's shed

As I wrote in my previous post, Meredith was envious of the Barries because at their summer home at Black Lake Cottage they were surrounded by pine woods. He loved all trees ... but pines had a special place in his heart. Today, not at all expected on the chalk downs, we can see a few mature pines growing in the garden of Flint Cottage, including one either side of The Chalet which was built by Meredith and was where Meredith did his writing. I judge these pines to be about 100 years old, and I'm prepared to wager that Meredith not only planted them there but that their origin was within sight of Black Lake Cottage.

Flint Cottage and part of garden, including The Chalet

The Chalet
Note the pine trees on either side

The timber-boarded chalet was used not only for writing but also occasionally for relaxing and sleeping: 'Anything grander than the days and nights in my porch you will not find away from the Alps: for the dark line of my hill runs up to the stars, the valley below is a soundless gulf. There pace like a shipman before turning in. In the day with the south west blowing I have a brilliant universe rolling up to me.'

Upon hearing of Meredith's rather sudden death on May 18, 1909, Barrie made straight for Flint Cottage to be with Meredith's relatives. As we read in Denis Mackail's The Story of J. M. B., he 'stood by, mourning and helping, in the unmistakable character of the hero's closest surviving friend.'

Barrie also busied himself in two significant ways. Again quoting Mackail: 'It was he, also, who joined in organising the request – which is said to have had royal support – that the hero's ashes should be laid in Poet's Corner. The Dean [of Westminster Abbey], however, had strange but dogged doubts, and refused. So Meredith was buried, by the side of his second wife, in Dorking Cemetery, and the world of literature must gather to honour him there. Barrie amongst them; and three days later the well-known tribute - presently to be published by Constable's, and again, long afterwards, in The Greenwood Hat – appeared on the green pages of the Westminster Gazette. Neither Dorking nor the Abbey was its heading, and the skill that went into it has seldom been equalled – by this or any other author – and never surpassed. It was terrific, and Barrie knew it. In the midst of his grief he could still see, and more than appreciate, the perfection of his own art.'

In his fanciful essay Barrie imagined the old man sitting on the crest of the hill which rises from Barrie's Bank, in front of Flint Cottage, chuckling at the sight of his own funeral cortege solemnly accompanying an empty coffin to the cemetery at Dorking.

_____________________

Neither Dorking nor the Abbey

later published as

George Meredith 1909

by J. M. Barrie



GEORGE MEREDITH
BOX HILL
May 22, 1909

All morning there had been a little gathering of people outside the gate. It was the day on which Mr. Meredith was to be, as they say, cremated. The funeral coach came, and a very small thing was placed in it and covered with flowers. One plant of the wall-flower in the garden would have covered it. The coach, followed by a few others, took the road to Dorking, where, in familiar phrase, the funeral was to be, and in a moment or two all seemed silent and deserted, the cottage, the garden, and Box Hill.

The cottage was not deserted, as They knew who now trooped into the round in front of it, their eyes on the closed door. They were the mighty company, his children, Lucy and Clara and Rhoda and Diana and Rose and old Mel and Roy Richmond and Adrian and Sir Willoughby and a hundred others, and they stood in line against the box-wood, waiting for him to come out. Each of his proud women carried a flower, and the hands of all his men were ready for the salute.


In the room on the right, in an armchair which had been his home for years – to many the throne of letters in this country – sat an old man, like one forgotten in an empty house. When the last sound of the coaches had passed away he moved in his chair. He wore gray clothes and a red tie, and his face was rarely beautiful, but the hair was white and the limbs were feeble, and the wonderful eyes dimmed, and he was hard of hearing. He moved in his chair, for something was happening to him, and it was this, old age was falling from him. This is what is meant by Death to such as he, and the company awaiting knew. His eyes became again those of the eagle, and his hair was brown, and the lustiness of youth was in his frame, but still he wore the red tie. He rose, and not a moment did he remain within the house, for “golden lie the meadows, golden run the streams,” and “the fields and the waters shout to him golden shouts.” He flung open the door, as They knew he would do who were awaiting him, and he stood there looking at them, a general reviewing his troops. They wore the pretty clothing in which he had loved to drape them; they were not sad like the mourners who had gone, but happy as the forget-me-nots and pansies at their feet and the lilac overhead, for they knew that this was his coronation day. Only one was airily in mourning, as knowing better than the others what fitted the occasion, the Countess de Saldar. He recognized her sense of the fitness of things with a smile and a bow. The men saluted, the women gave their flowers to Dahlia to give to him, so that she, being the most unhappy and therefore by him the most beloved, should have his last word, and he took their offerings and passed on. They did not go with him, these, his splendid progeny, the ladies of the future, they went their ways to tell the whole earth of the new world for women which he had been the first to foresee.

Without knowing why, for his work was done, he turned to the left, passing his famous cherry-blossom, and climbed between apple-trees to a little house of two rooms, whence most of that noble company had sprung. It is the Chalet, where he worked, and good and brave men will for ever bow proudly before it, but good and brave women will bow more proudly still. He went there only because he had gone there so often, and this time the door was locked; he did not know why nor care. He came swinging down the path, singing lustily, and calling to his dogs, his dogs of the present and the past; and they yelped with joy, for they knew they were once again to breast the hill with him. He strode up the hill whirling his staff, for which he had no longer any other use. His hearing was again so acute that from far away on the Dorking road he could hear the rumbling of a coach. It had been disputed whether he should be buried in Westminster Abbey or in a quiet churchyard, and there came to him somehow a knowledge (it was the last he ever knew of little things) that people had been at variance as to whether a casket of dust should be laid away in one hole or another, and he flung back his head with the old glorious action, and laughed a laugh “broad as a thousand beeves at pasture.” Box Hill was no longer deserted. When a great man dies – and this was one of the greatest since Shakespeare – the immortals await him at the top of the nearest hill. He looked up and saw his peers. They were all young, like himself. He waved the staff in greeting. One, a mere stripling, “slight unspeakably,” R. L. S., detached himself from the others, crying gloriously, “Here's the fellow I have been telling you about!” and ran down the hill to be the first to take his Master's hand. In the meanwhile an empty coach was rolling on to Dorking.

George Meredith (1828-1909)

Our life is but a little holding, lent
To do a mighty labour: we are one
With heaven and the stars when it is spent
To serve God's name: else die we with the sun.

Quatrain from 'Vittoria'

(reproduced on George Meredith's headstone in Dorking cemetery)

When barely in his twenties George Meredith abandoned a career in law to become a prolific poet and novelist. He is credited with having helped Thomas Hardy start his literary career and he succeeded Tennyson as president of the Society of Authors. In 1905 he was appointed to the Order of Merit by King Edward VII.

My grandmother was lucky enough to meet Meredith briefly on the occasions of his visits to her employer, J. M. Barrie, at Black Lake Cottage, near Farnham, Surrey:


Other famous visitors were mostly from the literary and artistic world. One of the most welcome ones was the poet George Meredith, then in his seventies, who twice drove over from his home on Box Hill. I was so excited when Mrs Barrie informed me that he was expected, for he was my favourite poet; I especially loved his South-West Wind in the Woodland. Mr Barrie had admired Meredith for years and, after travelling out from London to Box Hill, where he sat for hours on the bank opposite Meredith's Flint Cottage – the bank has since been named 'Barrie's Bank' - had become very close friends with him. He was also very special to Mrs Barrie, perhaps because he shared her enthusiasm for her lovely garden. Meredith was envious of the Barries because they were surrounded by pine woods. He loved all trees – his cottage was closely bounded on three sides by deciduous woodland, and some of his poems included wonderful descriptions of trees - but pines had a special place in his heart and he loved to walk among them in all weathers. Mrs Barrie clearly thought the white-bearded, eye-twinkling, always laughing Meredith was a charming gentleman. And, from what little I saw of him, so did I.

(Extracted from It Might Have Been Raining by Robert Greenham, Elijah Editions 2005)

George Meredith in 1893

Here is that favourite poem of my grandmother's:


SOUTH-WEST WIND IN THE WOODLAND
by George Meredith, OM

The silence of preluded song -
AEolian silence charms the woods;
Each tree a harp, whose foliaged strings
Are waiting for the master's touch
To sweep them into storms of joy,
Stands mute and whispers not; the birds
Brood dumb in their foreboding nests,
Save here and there a chirp or tweet,
That utters fear or anxious love,
Or when the ouzel sends a swift
Half warble, shrinking back again
His golden bill, or when aloud
The storm-cock warns the dusking hills
And villages and valleys round:
For lo, beneath those ragged clouds
That skirt the opening west, a stream
Of yellow light and windy flame
Spreads lengthening southward, and the sky
Begins to gloom, and o'er the ground
A moan of coming blasts creeps low
And rustles in the crisping grass;
Till suddenly with mighty arms
Outspread, that reach the horizon round,
The great South-West drives o'er the earth,
And loosens all his roaring robes
Behind him, over heath and moor.
He comes upon the neck of night,
Like one that leaps a fiery steed
Whose keen black haunches quivering shine
With eagerness and haste, that needs
No spur to make the dark leagues fly!
Whose eyes are meteors of speed;
Whose mane is as a flashing foam;
Whose hoofs are travelling thunder-shocks; -
He comes, and while his growing gusts,
Wild couriers of his reckless course,
Are whistling from the daggered gorse,
And hurrying over fern and broom,
Midway, far off, he feigns to halt
And gather in his streaming train.

Now, whirring like an eagle's wing
Preparing for a wide blue flight;
Now, flapping like a sail that tacks
And chides the wet bewildered mast;
Now, screaming like an anguish'd thing
Chased close by some down-breathing beak;
Now, wailing like a breaking heart,
That will not wholly break, but hopes
With hope that knows itself in vain;
Now, threatening like a storm-charged cloud;
Now, cooing like a woodland dove;
Now, up again in roar and wrath
High soaring and wide sweeping; now,
With sudden fury dashing down
Full-force on the awaiting woods.

Long waited there, for aspens frail
That tinkle with a silver bell,
To warn the Zephyr of their love,
When danger is at hand, and wake
The neighbouring boughs, surrendering all
Their prophet harmony of leaves,
Had caught his earliest windward thought,
And told it trembling; naked birk
Down showering her dishevelled hair,
And like a beauty yielding up
Her fate to all the elements,
Had swayed in answer; hazels close,
Thick brambles and dark brushwood tufts,
And briared brakes that line the dells
With shaggy beetling brows, had sung
Shrill music, while the tattered flaws
Tore over them, and now the whole
Tumultuous concords, seized at once
With savage inspiration,--pine,
And larch, and beech, and fir, and thorn,
And ash, and oak, and oakling, rave
And shriek, and shout, and whirl, and toss,
And stretch their arms, and split, and crack,
And bend their stems, and bow their heads,
And grind, and groan, and lion-like
Roar to the echo-peopled hills
And ravenous wilds, and crake-like cry
With harsh delight, and cave-like call
With hollow mouth, and harp-like thrill
With mighty melodies, sublime,
From clumps of column'd pines that wave
A lofty anthem to the sky,
Fit music for a prophet's soul -
And like an ocean gathering power,
And murmuring deep, while down below
Reigns calm profound;--not trembling now
The aspens, but like freshening waves
That fall upon a shingly beach; -
And round the oak a solemn roll
Of organ harmony ascends,
And in the upper foliage sounds

A symphony of distant seas.
The voice of nature is abroad
This night; she fills the air with balm;
Her mystery is o'er the land;
And who that hears her now and yields
His being to her yearning tones,
And seats his soul upon her wings,
And broadens o'er the wind-swept world
With her, will gather in the flight
More knowledge of her secret, more
Delight in her beneficence,
Than hours of musing, or the lore
That lives with men could ever give!
Nor will it pass away when morn
Shall look upon the lulling leaves,
And woodland sunshine, Eden-sweet,
Dreams o'er the paths of peaceful shade; -
For every elemental power
Is kindred to our hearts, and once
Acknowledged, wedded, once embraced,
Once taken to the unfettered sense,
Once claspt into the naked life,
The union is eternal.

I want to be one who is touched by the sun

Something to complement my recent 'Touched by the sun' post:

If you want to be brave
And reach for the top of the sky
And the farthest point on the horizon
Do you know who you'll meet there
Great soldiers and seafarers,
Artists and dreamers
Who need to be close, close to the light
They need to be in danger of burning by fire
And I, I want to get there
I, I want to be one,
One who is touched by the sun,
One who is touched by the sun

Often I want to walk
The safe side of the street
And lull myself to sleep
And dull my pain
But deep down inside I know
I've got to learn from the greats,
Earn my right to be living,
Let my wings of desire
Soar over the night
I need to let them say
"She must have been mad"
And I, I want to get there
I, I want to be one,
One who is touched by the sun,
One who is touched by the sun

I've got to learn from the greats,
Earn my right to be living,
With every breath that I take,
Every heartbeat
And I, I want to get there
I, I want to be one,
One who is touched by the sun,
One who is touched by the sun.

Lyrics written by Carly Simon for Jackie Onassis (Kennedy), released on her 1994 album, "Letters Never Sent"

Touched By The Sun by Carly Simon

Total solar eclipse, Turkey, March 29, 2006

180 degrees of 360 degrees of sunset, Turkey, March 29, 2006

Touched by the sun

I want to share my wonderful experience of the total solar eclipse on March 29, 2006. The event had a profound impact on me and I cannot get it out of my head. Actually, I don't want to get it out of my head. I think the memory of such a dramatic event remains forever. Indeed, a witness to a total solar eclipse is surely changed, maybe even a little deranged, by it.

For this particular eclipse the narrow path of totality started in South America, crossed the Atlantic Ocean, Africa (Ghana to Libya), the Mediterranean Sea, Turkey, and on (north-eastwards) across Asia.

The path of the Moon's umbral shadow (shown here in dark blue) began in Brazil and extended across the Atlantic, northern Africa, and central Asia where it ended at sunset in western Mongolia. NASA illustration.

For Europeans seeking the great experience the most convenient sites were along a stretch of Turkey's Mediterranean coastline east of Antalya, where there is an airport. This region also had the best chance of favourable weather conditions, ie a clear sky.

Shaded band shows the path of totality across Turkey

Hundreds of thousands of Europeans flew to Turkey especially for the eclipse. Our holiday tour company alone took about 4,000 people to a handful of 5 star hotels for a one-night stay. And there were people of other nationalities there also. Many people were solar eclipse fanatics who try to witness every such eclipse, photograph it, video it, etc, with expensive equipment, and some were professional astronomers. Others, like Sue and me, had had their first taste of a total solar eclipse in Cornwall and South Devon in 1999 - which was marred by dense cloud cover but nevertheless had been a dramatic and moving experience - and just had to experience another one, whether it turned out to be clearly visible or not. The intervening total eclipses (including in Antarctica and Madagascar) were in the southern hemisphere and to witness those would have involved major investment of time and money.

Sue and I decided we should witness this eclipse on the sandy Mediterranean beach, close to the water's edge. We were not alone, although most people remained within the hotel's expansive grounds and gardens. The anticipation of the event was very high, some people staking their claim to a position hours before the eclipse.

'First contact' (when the moon's silhouette started to 'bite' into the bottom right of the sun's disc) occurred at 12.38pm. 'Second contact' (when the moon's silhouette first covered the sun's disc totally) was at 1.55pm. During this first phase the light and temperature dropped progressively, imperceptibly for much of the time, and then increasingly noticeably. By now it was getting cold, and the light was spooky - low contrast, and with a greyish hue. Shadows became fuzzy. All birds had flown off somewhere and fallen silent. Finally, the light dropped remarkably faster during the last few seconds - rather like dimming the lights in a theatre - yet its acceleration and silent, foreboding inevitability never ceases to amaze even the most hardened of eclipse chasers.

Now, we no longer needed to protect our eyes with the safety glasses when gazing upward, and we saw that the huge hemispherical sky was not completely dark and black but, with the exception of a narrow band above the horizon, a deep, deep blue, and only the moon's silhouette was black. The moon was surrounded by the glow of the sun and we could see long white 'streamers' radiating out from the sun, most prominently at top left and bottom right, as we viewed it, indicating a small portion of the sun's enormous magnetic field.

The indescribably beautiful sight of totality - photo by Miloslav Druckmüller

We could see three planets: Venus, by far the brightest; Mercury; and Mars. In fact Venus was visible for some minutes before and after totality. By this time Saturn had just risen above the eastern horizon but was not visible to us, and this was because it lay within the brightly-coloured band of sky akin to that seen immediately after the sun has set - red, orange, yellow - which eerily extended 360 degrees around us just as if the sun had set everywhere. We were, of course, peering out at distant daylight beyond the edge of the gigantic, 100-mile wide shadow of the moon.

Diamond ring at 2nd contact - Photo by Pete Lawrence


Start of totality. Note the prominence at top - Photo by Paul Yates

This incredibly beautiful spectacle lasted for 3mins 45 seconds, but it wasn't just the awesome sight which impressed. There was silence broken only by people speaking occasionally and in hushed tones. And then the voices grew even quieter as folks became increasingly overwhelmed by their emotions, and some were crying. Sue was shaking uncontrollably, and not just because of the cold. I became speechless with a lump in my throat, and I knew that if I tried to say anything meaningful I would end up blubbering! I defy anyone not to be overcome by the experience. The astronomers and 'anoraks' were gasping at the extent and beauty of the pattern of the sun's streamers and the images in their telescopes, and it was evident from hearing them that we were experiencing an exceptionally spectacular eclipse.

Totality. Extra exposure reveals streamers - Photo by Peter Vasey

A woman nearby left her husband and wandered into the sea for a leisurely ecliptic swim; was this a sudden impulse or had she long-dreamed of doing this?

'Third contact', when the sun starts to reappear, occurred all too soon. At the first hint of it people's voices started growing louder in anticipation of what was to follow, for we all knew that the sight of Bailey's Beads, and then the 'diamond ring', would be fleeting. No blinking now. The first we saw of the sun was the beads of light passing between gaps in the moon's mountains on the moon's bottom right edge,

Bailey's beads at 3rd contact - photo by Brian Woosnam

and these were rapidly followed by the appearance of the 'diamond', fantastically bright, which grew with increasing size and intensity very rapidly forcing us to revert to our safety glasses immediately.

Diamond ring at 3rd contact - Photo by Paul Yates

The growing voices were now shouting and cheering; more crying, clapping, hugging and kissing. Sue said it was like a rebirth, and she was right. The swimming woman rose serenely from the sea and returned silently to her husband for a long kiss and embrace. Surely there was never such mass peacetime emotion on a beach as now.

The inevitable rapid return of daylight and warmth seemed to be taken for granted by everyone and was not accompanied by the same feelings as the period before totality, and within just a few minutes, while there was talk of nothing but the profound experience we had all shared, many of us suddenly realised we were hungry and made our way in to the hotel to grab an overdue lunch.

Photo-montages showing complete sequence - by Ian Wardlaw

A good website for 2006 eclipse pictures, including most of those I have used to illustrate my account, is:
http://www.popastro.com/sections/solar/total2006_rep.htm

The website with the most stunning images is: http://www.zam.fme.vutbr.cz/~druck/Eclipse/Ecl2006th/0-info.htm


Sue and I wouldn't have missed this eclipse for anything. Later we heard folks who had travelled all over the world to twenty or more total solar eclipses exclaim that this one was the best they'd witnessed. Weren't we lucky? I thoroughly recommend the experience to everyone. It really is worth all the travelling time, inconvenience and expense, even if you spend just one day or night at the destination. A week or more's holiday would, of course, make more sense. Keeping these factors within sensible limits, the next four practicable opportunities for us Europeans are:

1: August 1, 2008, in Siberia, Mongolia and China. See: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEplot/SEplot2001/SE2008Aug01T.GIF

2: July 22, 2009, in India and Nepal. See: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEplot/SEplot2001/SE2009Jul22T.GIF

3: August 21, 2017, from the Pacific Ocean, right across the USA, to the Atlantic Ocean. See: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEplot/SEplot2001/SE2017Aug21T.GIF

4: April 8, 2024, again across the USA. See: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEplot/SEplot2001/SE2024Apr08T.GIF

If you would like to see NASA's information on all the solar eclipses (and you really need consider only the total ones) then start with this link: http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/eclipse.html


If any fellow Britons are thinking of waiting until the next total solar eclipse visible in Britain, they need to think again. There won't be one here until 2090 and it won't be very long lasting either. There will be several great ones visible in Britain throughout the 22nd century, but what consolation is that?

Picasso Morphed

Following on from my last post, how could I not also alert you to another morphing miracle, seemingly by the same creator?

Women in Art