{"id":154682,"date":"2021-09-20T12:05:20","date_gmt":"2021-09-20T16:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=154682"},"modified":"2026-03-16T11:49:33","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T15:49:33","slug":"harvest-moon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/","title":{"rendered":"Harvest Moon"},"content":{"rendered":"

In her monthly column\u00a0The Moon in Full<\/a>, Nina MacLaughlin illuminates humanity\u2019s long-standing lunar fascination. Each installment is published in advance of the full moon.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Pieter Brueghel the Elder, Landscape with the Fall of Icarus<\/em>, ca. 1558, oil on canvas mounted on wood, 29 x 44″. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n

In 1957, the first satellite was launched into orbit around the earth. A gleaming metallic sphere about two feet in diameter with four long antennae, it had the look of a robot daddy longlegs. It weighed a hundred and eighty-four pounds and sped through space at about eighteen thousand miles per hour. After three months and more than fourteen hundred spins around this planet, it reentered earth\u2019s atmosphere, blazing into flames.<\/p>\n

This event, positioning something manufactured by human hands into the same realm as moon and sun and stars, was \u201csecond in importance to no other,\u201d Hannah Arendt writes. It marked the moment when humankind named the relief that we would one day be able to escape earth\u2019s bounds. Science made real \u201cwhat men anticipated in dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n

In dreams, they anticipated the moon. They anticipated flinging themselves away from the earth up to the glowing pearl in night space. They\u2019d been dreaming this for a long time, who knows how long. The moon, earth\u2019s shadowy white sister, is the ultimate dream object. Even if not dreamed of directly, the moon is dreamtime\u2019s overseer, companion; it\u2019s the quiet warden of the night mind. Lyndon B. Johnson watched the Russian satellite move across the sky and knew: \u201cSecond in space is second in everything.\u201d In 1961, John F. Kennedy said, \u201cI believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth.\u201d And thus, we who are earthbound began \u201cto act as though we were dwellers of the universe,\u201d Arendt writes. Perhaps we always have been, but now we have the tools to see. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s the view like from the moon? Some argue that seeing earth from moon\u2019s vantage gives \u201chumans a false sense of independence from this planet,\u201d as Daisy Hildyard writes in The Second Body<\/em>. She talks of Earthrise<\/em>, the iconic image taken from lunar orbit in December 1968 by the astronaut William Anders, which shows the moon\u2019s pocked and chalky surface in the foreground and the swirling blue-white dome of earth floating three quarters full in the blackness. A collective wow resulted, seeing this planet from that perspective, and an altered sense of our place in the cosmic swing of things. Fifty years after the photograph was taken, astronaut Anders said: \u201cIt really undercut my religious beliefs. The idea that things rotate around the pope and up there is a big supercomputer wondering whether Billy was a good boy yesterday? It doesn\u2019t make any sense.\u201d A supercomputer in the sky doesn\u2019t make sense, no, but what does? How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing? Way up like that, \u201chumans look down from a distance on all other forms of life,\u201d Hildyard writes. It can \u201cmake the human feel superhuman.\u201d A little like a god.<\/p>\n

One man, recently, flew 282,480 feet into the air. Another man, recently, flew 351,210 feet into the air. Both entered space. Both reached a point so far away from earth, they escaped its gravitational tug. Of the two men, Richard Branson was first to penetrate, with Virgin Galactic. Jeff Bezos went higher up. Branson\u2019s craft looked more like a traditional plane, with a \u201cfeathering system\u201d to ensure a smooth runway landing. Bezos built a phallus with a feather painted on it, rising up the shaft. \u201cHe\u2019s Icarus\u2009\/\u2009he\u2019s hickory-dickerous \u2026 He\u2019s a god now, the talk of the town. He\u2019s got no place to go but down,\u201d writes John Hodgen in a poem called \u201cFor the Man with the Erection Lasting More Than Four Hours.\u201d Launch to climax to landing, tumescence to detumescence, Bezos\u2019s flight lasted a little over ten minutes.<\/p>\n

Blue Origin is the name of his space concern. Our blue origin, the water all life came crawling from, the churning primal scene on our Blue Planet, our Mother Earth. He traveled as far away as he could, so far he couldn\u2019t feel her pull, to look back down upon her, it, us, the whole blue world, knowing, too, that many were looking at him, the way we look up at the moon.<\/p>\n

New Shepard<\/em> was the name of Bezos\u2019s rocket, named for Alan Shepard, the first American to go to space. But it announces the stakes. Aren\u2019t we meant to hear an altered echo of good shepherd? Doesn\u2019t it nudge the mind that way, even a mind that doesn\u2019t know much about the Bible? John 10:14: \u201cI am the good shepherd,\u201d says Jesus. \u201cI know my sheep and my sheep know me\u2014just as the Father knows me and I know the Father.\u201d The modern age began, writes Arendt, \u201cwith a turning-away, not necessarily from God, but from a god who was the Father of men in heaven.\u201d That supercomputer in the sky.<\/p>\n

Fathers, sons, flight\u2014as far as fathers go, no one would rank Daedalus as World\u2019s #1 Dad. Why didn\u2019t he and his son Icarus make their famous flight at night? Moonlight won\u2019t melt wax. But I think Daedalus knew exactly what he was doing. Years before his fateful flight with Icarus, Daedalus, master craftsman, took his nephew Perdix under his wing, to teach him about inventing. The boy showed promise: He saw a fish spine on the sand and invented the saw. He joined metal arms with a hinge, Ovid explains, \u201cand while the first stood firm\u2014erect and central\u2014the second moving arm described a circle.\u201d It was all too erect and central for Daedalus; he knew his nephew would outshine him, and he couldn\u2019t bear to be the the arm in orbit around the brighter sun. So he shoved his nephew off a high wall. Athena swept in before the boy splattered on the cobblestone and turned him to a low-flying partridge. Did Daedalus know Icarus would steer himself toward a more powerful god, the fiery sun itself? Was his sun-timed flight on wings of wax a subtler shove? A father knows his son. No goddess switched Icarus into a bird or a fish. Hickory-dickerous, Icarus, ichthus, back to the water he went, joining the ghosts in the ocean.<\/p>\n

And anyway, had they flown by moonlight, we wouldn\u2019t have learned of the consequences of ambition unmatched by ability. And Brueghel would not have painted the shepherds and farmers not seeing Icarus splash into the sea, and Auden would not have written \u201chow everything turns away\u2009\/\u2009quite leisurely from the disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Icarus complex, a lesser known diagnosis in the satellite of psychological complexes, is a condition of overambition, characterized by cynosural narcissism\u2014a craving for attention and admiration, \u201ca desire to attract and enchant all eyes, like a star in the firmament,\u201d as the psychiatrist Henry A. Murray, who first coined the term, put it. It\u2019s defined, too, by ascensionism, or the wish, in Murray\u2019s words, \u201cto overcome gravity, to stand erect, to grow tall, to dance on tiptoe, to walk on water, to leap or swing in the air, to climb, to rise, to fly, or to float down gradually from on high and land without injury.\u201d Maybe one was not held enough as an infant. Maybe one\u2019s mother did not return one\u2019s gaze. A sense of free fall results. Can\u2019t get your mother\u2019s attention? You might try to defy gravity itself to get everyone else\u2019s. Maybe you know people like this. Maybe you are like this. No goal too lofty, and a back-of-brain anticipation of tumbling through space.<\/p>\n

When Bezos landed back on earth, he and the three other joyriders dribbled from the glans of the rocket. They beamed and waved, shaky-kneed, pumped their fists, looked Smurfie in their blue suits. They\u2019d been up to the lore-glutted spacescape and returned to tell of it, tracking a path for future deep-pocketed thrill seekers to follow. Money can\u2019t buy happiness, but it can help ensure you\u2019ll be woven into an unfolding mythology.<\/p>\n

They floated down and landed without injury, unlike Icarus, and unlike Phaeton, another son cautioned by his father, the god Apollo, when he was granted access to the chariot that pulls the sun across the earth. Not too high, not too low, Apollo says, and tries to dissuade him one last time: \u201cLet me bring light unto the world.\u201d Fathers sometimes have a hard time giving up the reins. Phaeton takes off, doomed from moment one. He flies too close to the earth, scorching its surface, boiling the seas, so that smoke-choked earth herself pleads with Zeus. \u201cIf all three realms are ruined\u2014sea and land and sky\u2014\u2009\/\u2009then we shall be confounded in old Chaos.\u2009\/\u2009Save from the flames what\u2019s left, if anything\u2009\/\u2009can still be saved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Save from the flames what\u2019s left, if anything can still be saved.<\/p>\n

We turned away from god as Father, but should the modern age end, Arendt asks, \u201cwith an even more fateful repudiation of an Earth who was the Mother of all living creatures under the sky?\u201d What a bind we\u2019ve put ourselves in, clinging to our mother\u2019s skirts and simultaneously lighting her skirts on fire. What a bind we\u2019ve put ourselves in, creating technology that outpaces our ability to understand its consequences.<\/p>\n

It takes courage to launch oneself off the known surface into someplace new, to aim oneself into the place of dreams. And there\u2019s no extinguishing the impulse to explore. But it takes courage, too, to turn toward the disaster, to look from ground level, part of it, and ask, What can I do?<\/p>\n

Zeus throws a lightning bolt at Phaeton and he falls in fire, burning back to earth into the river Po. The body of water doesn\u2019t matter. Mediterranean Atlantic Mississippi Amazon. The consequences of the Icarus complex: a craving for immortality, an internalized father-son rivalry, perpetual adolescence.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo all you kids down there,\u201d says Branson in a video from his spaceflight, \u201cI was once a child with a dream, looking up to the stars. Now I\u2019m an adult in a spaceship, with lots of other wonderful adults, looking down to our beautiful, beautiful earth. To the next generation of dreamers, if we can do this, just imagine what you can do.\u201d A woman with a blond ponytail floats beside him, giggling.<\/p>\n

Old chaos is closer than we think. The risk of having a view from space: being too far away to see exactly what we\u2019ve reaped.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Nina MacLaughlin is a writer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her most recent book is\u00a0<\/em>Summer Solstice<\/a>. Her previous columns for the\u00a0<\/em>Daily\u00a0are\u00a0Winter Solstice<\/a>,\u00a0Sky Gazing<\/a>,\u00a0Summer Solstice<\/a>,\u00a0Senses of Dawn<\/a>, and\u00a0Novemberance<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2669,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[68286],"tags":[67827],"class_list":["post-154682","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-moon-in-full","tag-featured"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHarvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Harvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"639\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Nina MacLaughlin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"9 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Nina MacLaughlin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1aa79ce6b1ed14531f6ba13b37ff8838\"},\"headline\":\"Harvest Moon\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\"},\"wordCount\":1875,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg\",\"keywords\":[\"Featured\"],\"articleSection\":[\"The Moon in Full\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\",\"name\":\"Harvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00\",\"description\":\"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Harvest Moon\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"description\":\"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"width\":696,\"height\":696,\"caption\":\"The Paris Review\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1aa79ce6b1ed14531f6ba13b37ff8838\",\"name\":\"Nina MacLaughlin\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31c87f72f1def38557afff34e175c4e92aa03c6a699d825a5fdda6aa690f914e?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31c87f72f1def38557afff34e175c4e92aa03c6a699d825a5fdda6aa690f914e?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Nina MacLaughlin\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/nmaclaughlin\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Harvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin","description":"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Harvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin","og_description":"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?","og_url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/","og_site_name":"The Paris Review","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","article_published_time":"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00","article_modified_time":"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1000,"height":639,"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Nina MacLaughlin","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@parisreview","twitter_site":"@parisreview","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Nina MacLaughlin","Est. reading time":"9 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/"},"author":{"name":"Nina MacLaughlin","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1aa79ce6b1ed14531f6ba13b37ff8838"},"headline":"Harvest Moon","datePublished":"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00","dateModified":"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/"},"wordCount":1875,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg","keywords":["Featured"],"articleSection":["The Moon in Full"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/","name":"Harvest Moon by Nina MacLaughlin","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg","datePublished":"2021-09-20T16:05:20+00:00","dateModified":"2026-03-16T15:49:33+00:00","description":"September 20, 2021 \u2013 How do we make sense of what it means to flee our home planet? What happens when technology allows us to do something before we understand what we\u2019re doing?","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/bruegel.jpeg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/20\/harvest-moon\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Harvest Moon"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","name":"The Paris Review","description":"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization","name":"The Paris Review","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"The Paris Review"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/1aa79ce6b1ed14531f6ba13b37ff8838","name":"Nina MacLaughlin","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31c87f72f1def38557afff34e175c4e92aa03c6a699d825a5fdda6aa690f914e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/31c87f72f1def38557afff34e175c4e92aa03c6a699d825a5fdda6aa690f914e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Nina MacLaughlin"},"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/nmaclaughlin\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154682","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2669"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154682"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154682\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":154694,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154682\/revisions\/154694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154682"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154682"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154682"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}