The Stars: A New Way to See Them

H. A. Rey

H. A. Rey was life-long amateur astronomer and by the 1950s he had developed a remarkably simple method to learn the constellations. He substituted the sometimes arbitrary traditional representations of constellations with diagrams that actually (or at least more closely) depicted the name. “All I did was try various connecting lines between the stars of a group until I got the shape which made sense. What surprises me is that nobody has done it before. The basic idea is so simple!” Here is Rey’s example for Gemini (the Twins):

His books, The Stars: A New Way to See Them¹ (1952) and the simplified children’s title Find the Constellations² (1954), have been responsible for introducing 50 years worth of beginners to astronomy and are still in print and widely considered classics.

Constellation Chart

Hans Augusto Reyersbach (16 Sep 1898—26 Aug 1977), later shortened to just H.A. Rey, was born in Germany. After his education at the Wilhelm Gymnasium and infantry service in WWI, he supported himself as a lithographer and designer of circus posters. In 1926 he moved to Brazil to work for his future brother in-law’s import-export firm. It was here that he met his wife, the artist and copywriter, Margarete Elisabeth Waldstein (or Margaret Rey).³

After their marriage on 16 Aug 1935 they return to Paris, where they illustrated and published several children’s books. Because they were Jewish, and fearing the advance of the Nazis in 1940, they fled to Orléans and eventually wound up in New York.

Of the few possessions they carried was a manuscript for a children’s book that would become Curious George. First published by Houghton Mifflin in 1941, the series became one of the most widely known and loved children’s series of all time. Between 1941—1966 the Reys published seven Curious George titles, with Margaret writing the story and Hans doing the illustrations. Although Margaret later stated that “We worked very closely together and it was hard to pull the thing apart.”

The astronomy books, however, appear to have been a solo projects based on Hans’ long time passion of the subject.

Constellation date charts from The Stars, first edition (top), later editions (middle), and from Find the Constellations (bottom)

Rey’s illustrations and diagrams, especially the diagrams, turn out to be wonderful examples of informational graphics. As the Saturday Review commented in 1952: “The Stars is the best book available for its purpose. It is also a brilliant example of the combined use of art and writing in bringing science to the layman.” It’s not hard to find more complicated star charts, but you will be hard-pressed to find more useful ones. The diagrams surely must account for some of the books longevity.

The Celestial Sphere

1. Rey, H. A. The Stars: A New Way to See Them. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1952, and Rey, H. A. Find the Constellations. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1954. Both of these titles have been updated and reprinted numerous times over the years and both are still in print. Earlier hardcover versions of The Stars included a dust jacket that folded out into a wall-sized (22 × 26") star chart, which, at least with the first edition, could be purchased separately from the publisher.

2. A book that Rey quipped “...was so simple even an adult could understand it.”

3. Margaret’s formal art training included study at the Bauhaus in Dessau in 1927 (when both Klee and Kandinsky were on faculty) and the Dusseldorf Academy of Arts in 1928—1929.

11 Apr 2009 ‧ Illustration