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Polar Explorers |
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Being not overly fond of cold I am always surprised that I Iike reading about polar exploration but I do. Maybe it's the imagery of a cold desert - these accounts should always be read in winter. Maybe it's the heroism, but I doubt it, though I do not think anyone would fail to be impressed by Shackleton's achievements. I think the two things that I like most about them is the sheer craziness of most of the enterprises -some of which are very poorly planned or executed - and the glimpse of a lost world that I never quite understand.
Every account I have read is crammed with characters who cheerfully put up with awful frostbite, nine months without washing, painful blindness, starvation and grinding monotony. Like good patriots and the army and navy men that they frequently are, they toast the flag and their king or queen at the appropriate occasion. They always manage to find room for one or two cigars amongst the most meagre rations. If they are English they are sentimental about their dogs but think nothing of blasting away at countless seals, penguins and polar bears. Now read on.
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North Pole South Pole |
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Select Bibliogaphy
"Farthest North" by Fridtjof Nansen (1897)
Excellent account packed with photos and drawings if you can get hold of the original.
"Scott's Last Expedition" by Robert F. Scott (1923)
Based on his personal journals. Photographs taken by Herbert Ponting.
"South" by Ernest Shackleton (1919)
The full account of Shackleton's doomed transantarctic expedition. Original photographs by Frank Hurley are stunning.
"Mawson's Will: The Greatest Survival Story Ever Written" by Lennard Bickel (New York: Stein & Day, 1977)
Thrill to the whole story.
"The Crossing of Antarctica" by Sir Vivian Fuchs and Sir Edmund Hillary (1958)
A good solid account of what was also an important scientific expedition. Again, great photographs - some in colour - by George Lowe
