Science Stories

Philip Ball reveals the real Cyrano de Bergerac - forget the big nosed fictional character - and his links to 17th Century space flight. Cyrano was a soldier, gambler and duellist who retired from military exploits on account of his wounds around 1639, at the grand old age of 20. But he studied at university and, to judge from the books he went on to write, he was well versed in the philosophical and scientific debates of his day. He wrote two books, called The States and Empires of the Moon and its sequel, The States and Empires of the Sun. And he designed spaceships to travel to the moon and to the sun. Philip discusses the life and times of Cyrano with Mary Baine Campbell of Brandeis University in Massachusetts.Journeys to the New World in the seventeenth century were voyages of trade - and ultimately of colonisation. What those travellers wanted were minerals, spices, gold, rare and precious objects that could fetch a fortune in the Old World. Today, the profit motive has returned to space travel. Effor