Collected works

摘要

When the media proclaimed Hale-Bopp as the potential "comet of the century", astronomers crossed their fingers. Only ten years earlier the public had been wound into a frenzy of expectation over Halle's Comet. On cold winter evenings parents waited with children for hours to look through public telescopes at the once-in-a-lifetime visitor. They were rewarded with a "Is that it?" when their offspring saw the faint, fuzzy smudge that was Halley.