The fault, dear Brutus

[altariel]

I'm writing a story for a LoTR round robin, in which a character is being taught about the constellations and the stars by another character, his grandfather. I've picked Sirius.

Now, I know nothing about the stars, so I've been learning all this as I go along. If I'm making some mistakes, I'd be really grateful if someone could point them out.

By use of this very clever website, I've got the latitude of the place where the story is set, and the time at which the sun rises and sets on a particular day in the month when the round robin participants have decided this story is taking place.

Then I was sent to a very clever piece of software which tells me what time Sirius would appear above the horizon at that latitude on that same day.

I want to set the story in the early evening.

My problem is that Sirius seems to set round about 6pm, while the sun sets around 7.30pm.

My questions is would Sirius actually be visible at all? And am even asking the right kinds of questions here?

Various people have said to me: 'I think you can have some creative licence here...' or 'Fudge it.' But I think this kind of attention to detail matters in a Tolkien story.

Comments

[ithilwen.livejournal.com]

Sounds to me like you'd be better off picking another star.
:( Learning all the constellations takes about year, for precisely the reason you've just discovered - the night sky has "seasons". Sounds like Sirius is out-of-season for you at the time this story is set.

What date is the story taking place on? I enjoy astronomy, so I'd be happy to give you a hand with this particular project if you want it.

[(Anonymous)]

Sirius would not be visible. You have three options:

1) Pick a different astronomical object. Venus (or should I say Earendil) would be worth checking out.

2) Do what Arthur C Clarke would do: go ahead with Sirius, but precede your story with a short note explaining that you know very well that Sirius should have set in real life, but it was thematically important that it be Sirius so you decided to move it 30 degrees in the sky.

3) Do what Tolkien would do: use Sirius, and create a mammoth myth cycle climaxing with a violent and terrible divine intervention in which the orientation of the celestial sphere is abruptly shifted in order to account for the inconsistency. Make no mention of this collossal epic in your story itself, apart from a subtle allusion in the philological roots of a minor character's nickname.

Iain

[executrix.livejournal.com]

When does Sirius appear? All depends on which owl Harry sends, dunnit.

Re RL bruises: . But I'm sure your viva will be a triumph.