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A cosmic trifecta

THE HUNT FOR PLANET X:
New Worlds and the Fate of Pluto
By Govert Schilling
303 pp. Springer $27.50

Reviewed by Ruth Douillette

Considering that the word planet comes from the Greek word for “wandering star,” none of what we call planets actually fit that term. Ranging from balls of gas to dense spheres of heavy metal, none of the planets is, or ever was, a star.

But that matters not. Planets they remain . . . except for Pluto, which, always the “odd man out,” lost its planet-hood in 2006, joining ranks with the ice dwarfs. Although it’s not the first to be demoted, it seems to have struck a chord with many who learned the mnemonic ditty to help remember the planets in order: My Very Excellent Mother Just Sat Upon Nine Pins (or pizza for the youngest generation). Now, for the time being, at least, mother sits upon nothing. Will she someday sit on Planet X?

Observation and a mathematical formula led to the discovery of Pluto in 1930. Something was way out there affecting orbits of other celestial bodies. When Pluto was found in the expected vicinity, it fit the formula and expectations enough to be crowned the ninth planet.

Govert Schilling, internationally acclaimed freelance astronomy writer who hails from the Netherlands, adds The Hunt For Planet X to the list of more than forty books he’s authored. This is the third to have been translated into English. Equally as exciting, asteroid 10986 bears his name—Govert. I’m assuming it was not Govert that took a too-close-for-comfort swoop past the earth this month.

In an interesting and understandable format, Schilling adeptly relays information that could conceivably sail as far over the average reader’s head as the moon. Each chapter is a stand-alone essay; arranged along a chronological time frame, they combine to tell the story of celestial discoveries in short, entertaining bites.

The chapter on how Pluto got its name is a human interest story to delight. Naming rights for the heavenly bodies were sought after, ego was involved, and much discussion took place before the decision was made. But in Pluto’s case, a little whimsy and a grandfatherly nudge played a role.

Eleven year-old Venetia Burney sat at the breakfast table and listened to her grandfather, Falconer Madan, “a true-blue Englishman” and head of the Library at the University of Oxford, “enthusiastically read aloud the report on the discovery of the ninth large planet.”

“I wonder what they will call this new planet,” he’d said. After a brief pause in which she called on her knowledge of mythology—the vast nothingness in outer space bespoke of the watery underworld—Venetia said, “They should call it Pluto.”

More whimsy, and a little of it’s-who-you-know: Madan sent a note with Venetia’s suggestion to his friend Herbert Turner, a leading astronomer in England.

“Miss Venetia will get the best chance I can give her,” the friend replied. “I scarcely think [the Royal Astrological Society] will find a better name.” And they didn’t.

While Hunt For Planet X is very much about the myriad and diverse bodies that revolve around the sun, it’s so much more. It’s about people for one thing—people who look to the heavens with curiosity. There are tales of serendipitous discovery, a stroke of luck, being in the right place at the right time, balanced against discovery that comes only after years of obsessive searching.

It’s asteroids, icy dwarfs, moons, and Kuiper Belt objects. It’s science, history, and mathematics. It’s formulas and orbital planes. It’s mystery.

And Schilling wraps it all in human cloth and delivers it in his companionable voice with a dose of winning, ironic humor. He shows us both the best and worst of human nature: generosity and greed, teamwork and solitary endeavor, the kind, the odd, and the angry.

It’s the past and it’s the future.

The ashes of Clyde Tombaugh, Pluto’s discoverer, were launched in the New Horizons space probe, along with an American flag, a Florida quarter, and a bit of carbon-fiber from SpaceShipOne—a manned spaceship designed for commercial space tourism. It also carries an instrument for measuring interplanetary dust: the Venetia Burney Student Dust Counter. Burney and Tombaugh’s widow are alive, but both much older than Pluto’s life as a planet; it’s unlikely either will live to see the probe sail past Pluto in 2015.

The universe has always captured the imagination of those who view it from the third planet. It was a small universe indeed when “apocalyptic superstition and scientific curiosity vied for prominence” and the most powerful telescopes showed the planets as only “small, round disks.”

Now that we see more clearly and much further into the vastness, the search continues. “Planet X may not exist, but the hunt will never come to an end. There will always be new horizons,” says Schilling. Those searching find themselves “in a quagmire of ambition, emotions, and envy.”

If you like astronomy, and people, and good story telling, this book hits the trifecta.

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Ruth Douillette retired after 35 years as a middle school teacher, and now freelances as a writer and photographer. Her essays have been published in the Christian Science Monitor, Cup of Comfort, Chicken Soup for the Soul, and Under Our Skin, an anthology about breast cancer. Her photography has been featured in flashquake's gallery of art. Ruth is a member of the Internet Writing Workshop where she’s an administrator for the Practice group. For a sample of her writing and photography, visit Upstream and Down~.

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