Rising above the ground

Text 1: An Ascent from the Pleasure Gardens, by Frederick Lyle

An original newspaper report written in a nineteenth-century voice; a period simulation, not an archival document.

Your correspondent was yesterday one of four passengers who made an ascent in the great balloon from the pleasure gardens, and he is bound to report that he has seldom been more frightened or more delighted. At the word of command the ropes were cast off, the crowd gave a roar, and the earth did not so much fall away as sink, quietly and with dreadful politeness, beneath the basket.

Within a few minutes London had become a map spread upon a table. The river was a grey ribbon, the steamers upon it no larger than beetles, and the great dome of St Paul’s might have been an inkwell. Most remarkable of all was the silence. The roar of the streets, which no Londoner escapes from cradle to grave, had vanished entirely, and we spoke to one another in whispers, as in church.

Your correspondent confesses that, looking down upon the courts and alleys where so many thousands labour, he felt the smallness of every human quarrel. The descent, upon a turnip field in Essex, restored him rapidly to his ordinary opinions.

Text 2: My First Flying Lesson, by Ben Hartigan

An original contemporary blog.

My sister bought me a trial flying lesson for my fortieth birthday, which I assumed was a joke about my age. It wasn’t. On a grey Sunday morning I found myself strapped into a tiny two-seater plane with an instructor called Nadia, who said “Nothing to worry about” in a voice that made me worry immediately. Then we were rolling, faster and faster, and the runway simply let go of us.

At two thousand feet the town I have lived in all my life turned into a model railway layout. The ring road was a grey loop, the cars were crawling beads, and the football ground looked like a green stamp. I could see my own street, which was strangely moving. I could not hear the traffic, only the steady drone of the engine, and when Nadia pointed things out we spoke through headsets as calmly as librarians.

Up there, the things that had annoyed me all week, the parking fine, the argument at work, seemed ridiculous. I landed with shaking knees and was back to worrying about the parking fine before I reached the car.

Both writers describe their first experience of flying.

What are the similarities between the writers’ experiences of flying?

Draw on evidence from both texts to support your answer.