Twilight
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Twilight is the time before sunrise, or after sunset, when sunlight scattered in the upper atmosphere illuminates the lower atmosphere, and the surface of the Earth is between light and dark. Often confused with dusk, twilight is specifically defined as the period either side of night-time during which it is possible to conduct outdoor activities without the aid of artificial light. Due to the unusual, romantic quality of the ambient light at this time, twilight has long been popular with photographers and painters, who refer to it as the "blue hour", after the French expression l'heure bleue.
The collateral adjective of "twilight" is crepuscular (for daylight it is "diurnal" and for night, "nocturnal"). The term is most frequently encountered when applied to certain species of insects and mammals that are most active during that time.
In art
- Die blaue Stunde (1890) by Max Klinger
Namesakes
- Twilight of the Idols, 1889, a book by Nietzsche
- The Twilight Zone, an American television series created by Rod Serling
See also
- Belt of Venus
- BMCT
- Dawn
- Dusk
- Earth's shadow, visible at twilight
- Gloom
- Green flash
- Polar night
- Sunrise
- Sunset
