ABSTRACT
Why Mars? I wrote a great deal of this book at a window that overlooks the house from which, on 13 March 1781, William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus. Today, the unassuming Bath townhouse is a popular museum devoted to Herschel’s life and work. For a modest fee, visitors can study his letters and books, inspect a replica of the telescope used to make the discovery, and wander around the garden from which he would have watched the skies.2
