I recently read Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot which was recommended to me by my Latin teacher. He knows I love the idea of space travel and will read any book I can find on the subject. When I first picked it up I assumed it would be a generic book about space and the mysteries it holds, but it turned out to be so much more. Pale Blue Dot is one of the most - if not THE most - beautifully written books I have ever read. The descriptions paint borderless paintings in the reader's mind that transport them into the vacuum of space. The book stresses that our problems and pressures, while they can loom large in our lives, are actually incredibly insignificant and we must keep that in mind. I also love the idea that everything that impacts us - large and small, positive and negative - exists on this one, tiny planet. Sagan refocuses our perspective in such a meaningful way using nothing but his words. Here is one of my favorite quotes in the book:
“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there - on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."
I urge every kid to read this - it's simply one of the most amazing books you'll ever hold.
“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there - on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."
I urge every kid to read this - it's simply one of the most amazing books you'll ever hold.
