The End of Night

Searching for Natural Darkness in an Age of Artificial Light

By: Paul Bogard

Narrated by: Paul Bogard

A deeply panoramic tour of the night, from its brightest spots to the darkest skies we have left.

A starry night is one of nature's most magical wonders. Yet in our artificially lit world, three-quarters of Americans' eyes never switch to night vision and most of us no longer experience true darkness. In The End of Night, Paul Bogard restores our awareness of the spectacularly primal, wildly dark night sky and how it has influenced the human experience across everything from science to art. From Las Vegas' Luxor Beam - the brightest single spot on this planet - to nights so starlit the sky looks like snow, Bogard blends personal narrative, natural history, science, and history to shed light on the importance of darkness - what we've lost, what we still have, and what we might regain - and the simple ways we can reduce the brightness of our nights tonight.

©2013 Paul Bogard (P)2014 Gildan Media LLC

Critic reviews

"A moving, poetic, immersive, multifaceted, and thought-provoking study... Terrific." ( Publishers Weekly)

An Important Book. A Beautiful Book.

This book is as beautiful as it is important. Paul Bogard takes us on a journey through the night, meeting the people of the night…from astronomers to nightshift workers and explores the history of our love/hate of darkness. This a cautionary tale to be sure, but it is so rich in its detail and history and even its questioning of our fear of the dark that you will be sad when it ends.

A little too poetic for my taste

I'm interested in this topic, and there was lots of good information in this book. However, for me, it was mixed in with a little bit too much literary poeticism surrounding that information expressing the author's feelings on the topic. Some of that is great obviously because you want to read a book by someone enthused about the topic. But when it starts to exceed 50% of the content it begins to feel more like filler. This may have been aggravated by the narration which had a little of "like wow man" tone to it.

Truly encapsulated love of night.

First, let me acknowledge some of the criticism of this book. Yes, it needs better organization in terms of how it flows from one chapter to the next. And yes, he’s light on citing the science.

However, I don’t think his goal was to read like a scientific news article, rather a emotional exploration of what the night means. When you take that thesis, the book firmly succeeds. I truly love this book as I connected many times over.

Having not sen the Milky Way, myself, until I was in my late 20s, I’ll never forget the tingling excitement and awe. It’s sadly rare that a source of so much curiosity for us as a species, has become so muddied by carelessness and fear.

To those who are looking for a how to on stopping light pollution (which is a serious pollution just like water, air and any terrestrial pollution), I recommend getting in touch with the International Dark Sky Association. This book will provide no answers for you. Like I said, it’s an exploration of our relationship w night, not a how to guide.

There’s also some unwarranted criticism driven by abstract fear (which as we know is more of a response to a stress than it is a meaningful determination of a single attribute). The relationship with artificial light can’t prevent any crime. Prima facie evidence in crime stats of a city indicate that murders happen and aren’t deterred by street lighting. I myself was a victim of an assault at 10 am in a highly populated place and also witnessed a thief steal large items at a local cvs at 12:03 pm.

At the end of the day, I’m always amazed at how afraid of the darkness we all are, and I think that drives much of the scapegoating we place on the dark. If light solved everything, my city would clearly be much safer than every other place around.

Next steps for any reader would be to begin to understand the massive ecological changes that occur from lighting. Not touched in this book, but is legitimate none the less, lighting is reshaping what insect species live, impacting animals up the food chain to birds.

Finally, if the Milky Way can be shared to all people, the beauty of night as a resource will stay a rural (mostly white) issue. We need to be inclusive about our night sky. It’s everyone’s. Not just a rural resource. Everyone needs to see the Milky Way. E-V-E-R-Y-O-N-E

Important book on a not-well-covered issue

This is a significant topic. The book is well thought out and an important contribution to an under-reported environmental issue. The effect of the loss of the night is incalculably serious to us all, and this book is a good starting point for nderstanding what we can do.

Fascinating Topic & Important Part of Conservation

Paul makes this underappreciated topic interesting and focuses on the many ways to fix it.