kqed: the northern lights

i can still remember the first time i saw what are known as the northern lights. i was on a canoe trip in algonquin park. i spent part of every night lying on my back on a beach watching the satellites and shooting stars flying overhead. on this one particular night i noticed a sort of gauzy waving film appear to the north west that gradually took on form and i knew as i watched that i was seeing what i had read about all those years before in my jack london books.

here's jack himself lounging on a chair while in his early twenties:

here's a typical excerpt from jack london's short story "the sun-dog trail":

"January has come and nearly gone. The days are very short. At
nine o'clock comes daylight. At three o'clock comes night. And it
is cold. And even I, Sitka Charley, am tired. Will we go on
forever this way without end? I do not know. But always do I look
along the trail for that which they try to find. There are few
people on the trail. Sometimes we travel one hundred miles and
never see a sign of life. It is very quiet. There is no sound.
Sometimes it snows, and we are like wandering ghosts. Sometimes it
is clear, and at midday the sun looks at us for a moment over the
hills to the south. The northern lights flame in the sky, and the
sun-dogs dance, and the air is filled with frost-dust."

to be honest, my first experience of the northern lights wasn't as clear and stunning as pictures i have seen since, but it was definitely there and was, even in its relatively diminished form, still beautiful and exciting.

the northern lights are also known as the aurora borealis. a wonderful collection of stories and images has been gathered on the exploratorium page. this wonderful image was taken at the lois station in southern sweden.



kqed is a public broadcasting company based in san francisco, california. the following program comes courtesy of kqed.

the northern lights: