Under The Martinborough Stars

Most people know that the sun is a star, and the stars are other suns further away. But are they really like our sun? Kinda, yes, but let’s dig deeper. 

In astronomy it’s often said that the sun is an average star. But it’s also not average for other reasons. How does our sun really compare to other stars? G type stars like our sun only account for around 5% of the stars in the universe. Commonly seen, but not that common. The most common stars are M type, red dwarfs that make up about 80% of all stars and are far smaller and fainter than the sun. Our closest neighbour, Proxima Centauri is one of them (not to be confused with Alpha Centauri A and B) Conversely, the most massive stars are very rare and just one hypergiant could fit hundreds of millions of suns within its roughly spherical volume. So, there’s an incredible range of sizes and brightness’s out there. 

OH BE A FINE GIRL (OR GUY), KISS ME…..…sorry. Just using an old-fashioned mnemonic for remembering the spectral classifications of stars. Like Never-Eat-Soggy-Weet-bix. Anyway, it’s OBAFGKM, with O being the hottest (blue) and M being the coolest (red). Replace your shower dials with blue for hot, as it should be. With our sun as a G type star, it’s on the cooler side in terms of the variety of temperatures star surfaces can be. Around 5600 Kelvin or 5300 celcius. Hot, but not that hot. Stellar cores can be millions of degrees Celsius. 

Our sun could most justifiably be called average in the fact it’s in the ‘main sequence’, doing what all stars do at first, happily fusing hydrogen to create helium. It will do so for a few billion years more. The Hertzsprung – Russell Diagram is very important in astronomy. It’s a graph plotting star temperature against luminosity (brightness). It demonstrates how the bulk of stars observed, fit somewhere along the main sequence, which looks like a sloping diagonal band among other regions of giants and dwarfs. These giants have transitioned into fusing heavier elements, and white dwarfs are ‘dead stars’. The glowing core leftover and our sun’s eventual fate. 

Here’s a couple more reasons our sun might not be so average. It’s still the only G type star we know of with so many planets. That is probably due to limitations in discovery so far but it may also be a bit special in that regard. More than half of the stars you see in the night sky are doubles. Binaries. They have an orbital partner. We think of our cycles of day and night as perfectly natural but there are plenty of planetary configurations  around other stars that would get some pretty funky day-night cycles, if any at all. So let’s be grateful for our mild tempered and relatively stable sun, the night and the ability to see other stars in all their different types. But let’s not be grateful for clouds. They can all disappear for a while. 

Aratoi’s Current Exhibitions

Rita Angus, Marjorie Marshall, 1938-39/1943, oil on canvas. © Reproduced courtesy of the Estate of Rita Angus. Purchased 2019. Te Papa (2019-0012-1).

A first for the Wairarapa is Te Papa’s touring exhibition – Rita Angus: New Zealand Modernist | He Ringatoi Hou o Aotearoa. The exhibition brings together 20 works by one of New Zealand’s most iconic 20^th century artists, Rita Angus (1908–1970) with many of these never been displayed before in the region. 

The paintings span Angus’s life and career as an artist, drawing out the themes of pacifism, feminism and nature that shaped so much of her work. 

Another visiting exhibition is Dwayne Duthie’s Double Edge Sword from Taranaki. This exhibition aims to communicate ideas on human drive and desire related to the human condition, the connection to self-preservation and survival and how they can be both a benefit and liability.

These works are presented in painting, sculpture and digital forms utilising the symbolic and the abstract to highlight our desire to acquire, defend, connect, learn and largely survive.

Dwayne Duthie: Double Edge Sword 28 October- 3 December

Rita Angus: New Zealand Modernist | He Ringatoi Hou o Aotearoa 30 September- 26 November

‘Light Over Liskeard’ by Louis de Bernieres’

One of the perks of owning a bookshop is that you can get your hands on advance copies of books. Book reps will often bring a small stack of pending titles to our meetings and my staff and I get to read ahead. It makes us better booksellers, better at recommending books to customers. 

‘Light Over Liskeard’ is one of those advance copies which is due in stores this month, but I read it in August and loved it. I’ve been holding off reviewing it until it was available to buy.

So here goes…

Set sometime in the not-too-distant future where cars are self-driving, bots take care of most menial things, children have only virtual friends and national security is increasingly fragile, Q (not his real name) is a quantum cryptographer for the British government. 

Q becomes aware that he knows how to end the world and that if he knows, so too do a number of others scattered across the world. But he isn’t sure that he knows what it means to live and he’s running out of time. He leaves the city, buys a derelict farmhouse on the moors and begins to prepare for what is to come.

The absolute delight of this book is the light touch of the author and his introduction of weird and quirky characters already resident on the moors: a hermit, a knight, a ghost, a widowed South American environmentalist and his lusty daughter, and a range of ‘reintroduced’ species roaming at large. 

I think what I liked most is that it isn’t what you think its going to be – there’s no doom, no wailing and gnashing of teeth, just good story telling and compelling characters that leave you strangely happy to have met them.

NEWS FROM FIRST CHURCH

As the rain beats down and high winds howl we’re told that Spring has sprung and benign weather is just around the corner. Maybe. In Martinborough one sure sign of renewal is seen every September in the vineyards, with new season buds and nascent leaves now making their first appearance.  Anyone passing First Church on a Sunday will also be struck by the lusty spring induced singing emanating from within.  Linger and listen to the tuneful standard hymns (better still, come in!) but be prepared to quicken your stride for any of the more challenging psalms which challenge a congregation’s musicality.

People are still buzzing about the Spring Fling fashion show last month which was financially rewarding and a huge success.  With 126 tickets sold the Town Hall was full to bulging.   The high fashion clothes being modelled were a great hit with discerning punters and the event is bound to become an annual hardy.  Entertainment from the fabulous Maynard girls was an added bonus.

Upcoming Events

• The trusty 2-day Kirk Fair is scheduled for 25^th and 26^th November and will have a fine array of cakes, produce, clothes and tasteful bric à brac on display.  Any donations welcome.  See you at the Waihinga Centre.

• You’ll need to stock up on decent books to ride out the last of the wet weather.  Come to the Church Hall for their Book Sale on 28^th October, 1.30 – 5pm.

• Women Remembered – Prof. Joan Taylor, 22 October at 12.45pm – 1^st Church Community Hall.

If you’re interested in learning about the role of women in the Bible, come to what will be a fascinating lecture by Prof. Joan Taylor.  She is eminently qualified for this modern topic having served in senior academic positions at Uni of Waikato, Harvard Divinity School, Kings College London and latterly at Victoria and currently Prof. at the Centre of Religion Melbourne.  She has a PhD in early Christian archaeology.