The moon will pass in front of the sun on April 8 to create a total solar eclipse, the first since 2017 to hit the lower 48 U.S. states. While the next such eclipse to cross Canada and the U.S. won’t take place until 2044, TIME has rounded up notable depictions of eclipses in novels, TV shows, and movies to help fill the khbrknews until then, courtesy of Lisa Yaszek, a Professor of Science Fiction Studies at Georgia Tech.
Eclipses seem to appear in stories when there’s a dramatic change of events in the plot and in moments of “dangerous and negative change, of chaos and confusion,” Yaszek says. Below are eight examples of eclipses in pop culture.
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court by Mark Twain
Yaszek calls Twain the first person who used a solar eclipse correctly in a work of modern science fiction. In the story, a 19th century engineer named Hank Morgan gets knocked out and wakes up in medieval Europe, and uses his knowledge of solar eclipses to gain power over Merlin and everyone else in King Arthur’s court. One description of an eclipse reads, “It grew darker and darker and blacker and blacker, while I struggled with those awkward sixth-century clothes. It got to be pitch dark, at last, and the multitude groaned with horror to feel the cold uncanny night breezes fan through the place and see the stars come out and twinkle in the sky. At last the eclipse was total.”
“Nightfall” by Isaac Asimov
This short story is about a group of scientists who have very emotional reactions to an eclipse. As Yaszek puts it, ”It’s a really powerful story about both how scientists can get it wrong, but also how scientists have feelings and how we all have feelings and how moved we are by these massive events around us.” One perception of what will take place after an eclipse, from a psychologist: “’’First the eclipse — which will start in three quarters of an hour — then universal Darkness and, maybe, these mysterious Stars — then madness, and…
