Simon Zonenblick - Writing and more

Following the historic launch of NASA’s Artemis 1 space programme, in which the space agency sent the Orion craft into lunar orbit in preparation for sending astronauts to the moon for the first time in half a century, I find myself embracing more and more the beautiful, liminally hypnotic Artemis, from US singer songwriter Gail Warning’s album Season of the Soul (2008).  Artemis has been a firm favourite since I first heard the song more than a decade ago, and this lyrical lunar love letter owes as much to moon mythology as it does to the phenomenon of space exploration. “Artemis, daughter of the wilderness,” sings Gail with tender melancholy, “your moonlit vision, cuts through the night…” and indeed, this enchanting album, listened to by moonlight or looking out into the night, does feel like a sort of nocturnal voyage of discovery. Identified by the Romans with Selene, the Greek goddess of the moon, the mythical Artemis was the sister of Apollo, and in Roman mythology gradually