"The Scream", that iconic painting that captures the internal angst we all experience from time to time was painted by Edvard Munch in Norway in 1893.

A source of interest for many in this painting is the vibrant red sky that provides the backdrop to tortured soul depicted. Donald Olson, a physics and astronomy professor at Texas State University thinks he has the answer to Munch's inspiration. He believes that debris thrown into the atmosphere by the great eruption at the island of Krakatoa, in modern Indonesia, created vivid red twilights in Europe from November 1883 through February 1884.

Olson believes he has stood on the spot where Munch was standing when the inspiration for the painting occured.

One of the high points of our research trip to Oslo came when we rounded a bend in the road and realized we were standing in the exact spot where Munch had been 120 years ago.

It was very satisfying to stand in the exact spot where an artist had his experience, the real importance of finding the location, though, was to determine the direction of view in the painting. We could see that Munch was looking to the southwest -- exactly where the Krakatoa twilights appeared in the winter of 1883-84.

The Green Man would be very satisfied too, if he could find someone to pay for a trip to Norway.