As you may recall the weather was terrible the summer of 1816 when Mary Shelley started writing Frankenstein. This was due to a volcanic eruption in Indonesia that affected weather patterns all over the world. The summer of 1816 is frequently referred to as “The Year Without a Summer“.

The recent volcanic eruption of Eyjafjallajokull in Iceland and how it is affecting the weather and flights over the Atlantic has been reminding me of what the summer of 1816 must have been like.

And I wonder if this ash cloud will inspire any great works of literature or if the primary result will be people complaining about how inconvenienced they are by their flights being canceled. If there’s one thing we don’t have any control over, it’s the weather.

Today we find out things instantly. Think about what it would have been like in 1816 when so many people would have had no idea why it was so cold and why their crops were failing. It must have been truly frightening.

Here is some information about the volcanic ash cloud from Wired Magazine and an article about how volcanoes have shaped history from BBC News