The Adelie Blizzard: Mawson’s Forgotten Newspaper 1913.

Preface by Emma McEwin. Introduction by Elizabeth Leane and Mark Pharoah. Adelaide: Friends of the State Library of South Australia…, 2010.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

An elegant facsimile of the newspaper of Douglas Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1913, taken from the only extant copy. The AAE had a well-stocked library, and though much of the content of the Blizzard was poetic doggerel, there was both serious and satiric discussion of books and also a series in each issue on Polar exploration, based on some of the library’s books.

Mawson: a Life.

Ayres, Philip. Melbourne, Aus.: The Miegunyah Press, 1999.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A balanced biography of Mawson, emphasizing his achievements but not ignoring his sometimes depressive personality and temper.

This Accursed Land.

Bickel, Lennard. Melbourne: Macmillan, 1977.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Bickel notes the absence of “heroics” in Home of the Blizzard, betrayed by his journals, however modest. An earlier version of Mawson’s Will, with some additional reading passages.

Born Adventurer: The Life of Frank Bickerton, Antarctic Pioneer.

Haddelsey, Stephen. Stroud, UK: Sutton Publishing, 2005.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Bickerton was a member of Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition, but resigned from Shackleton’s Endurance to join the war effort before Shackleton left for Antarctica. Although this is a full biography of Bickerton, the story of the AAE takes up the first half of the book, followed by a separate chapter on the Endurance. John King Davis, a multi-facited friend of Mawson, served as captain of Aurora, irritating a good number of officers and men, though seldom Mawson.

The Ice and the Inland: Mawson, Flynn, and the Myth of the Frontier.

Hains, Brigid. Melbourne, AU; Melbourne University Press, 2002.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A comparative study of two frontiersmen, Douglas Mawson’s work in Antarctica (mostly 1911-14) and John Flynn, a Presbyterian minister of the Australian Inland Mission. Concentrating on the AAE (1911-14) Hains has gone through many if not all of the diaries of participants, taking special note of their books and reading, more so than any expedition I know of.

Mawson’s Forgotten Men: The 1911-1913 Antarctic Diary of Charles Turnbull Harrisson.

Harrisson, Charles Turnbull. Edited by Heather Rossiter. Miller’s Point, NSW: Pier 9, 2011.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

p. 68, Friday March 8, 1912: After tea I fitted up the batten floor of the canoe (which was not loaded) as a bookshelf, & Hoadley opened the Library—some of the books damp. Rather disappointed in them. Not a poet in the lot. [Footnote 19, p. 291: The ‘Library’ was a selection of books donated by a rich benefactor, Campbell Mackellar.]

South with Mawson

Laseron, Charles F. in Antarctic Witness, introduced by Tim Bowden. Sydney, Australia: Angus and Robertson, 2000. (With Frank Hurley’s Shackleton’s Argonauts.).
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

First published in 1947, Laseron’s account of Mawson’s AAE is a gentle and generally optimistic account, even when describing Mawson’s perilous journey.

Vixere Fortes: A Family Archives.

Madigan, David Cecil. Kingston, Tasmania: Self-published, 2000.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

This family history of Australian Madigans includes a long chapter (p. 234-+387) on Cecil Madigan, a member of Mawson’s AAE team (1911-14). The latter is based on Cecil’s diaries which are very harsh on Mawson’s leadership and his ability to get the best out of his men. There are a good number of notes about reading:

The Home of the Blizzard, Being the Story of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, 1911-1914.

Mawson, Sir Douglas. Philadelphia: Lippincott; London: Heinemann, [1915].
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Mawson is certainly one of the legendary explorers of the Heroic Age, one who participated in a number of important expeditions, starting with Shackleton’s Nimrod journey. His expeditions were also among those best supplied with books and other reading matter.

Mawson’s Antarctic Diaries.

Mawson, Douglas. Edited by Fred Jacka & Eleanor Jacka. London: Unwin Hyman, 1988.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Introduction emphasizes Mawson’s faith in “Providence,” and notes that his very survival reduced the emotional impact that Scott’s death had on the public: World War I, followed by world depression, diverted public interest from the achievements of Douglas Mawson and other scientists and explorers in the Antarctic, and formed a break between the ‘heroic era’ and the ‘mechanical era’ in the history of Antarctic exploration. (p. xlii).

Alone on the Ice: The Greatest Survival Story in the History of Exploration.

Roberts, David. New York: Norton, 2013.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A straightforward rehash of the Mawson story, at somewhat greater length than others, but competently done. He doesn’t neglect the books and reading which is fairly well documented for this expedition. He makes the mistake of taking Huntford as gospel truth, assuming for example Kathleen Scott’s affair with Nansen. He also disparages Bickel’s Mawson’s Will, though that book is a much more dramatic telling of Mawson’s story.

Lady Spy, Gentleman Explorer: The Life of Herbert Dyce Murphy.

Rossiter, Heather. Sydney: Random House Australia, 2001.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A thoroughly fascinating account of a participant in Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911 which thoroughly debunks Mawson, only slightly more gently than Huntford did Scott.

Still No Mawson: Frank Stillwell’s Antarctic Diaries 1911-1913.

Stillwell, Frank. Edited by Bernadette Hince. Canberra, AUS: Australian Academy of Science, 2012.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Frank Stillwell was geologist on Douglas Mawson’s Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911-14. His diaries present him as a mild-mannered somewhat recessive personality, but they are candid enough to include several critical comments about the leader as moody, irascible, inconsistent, and arbitrary. Most of his comments on reading are confined to the period of the austral night of May to August 1912, and are mostly notes of what other people were reading, including Mawson reading aloud from Aurora Australis and South Polar Times (p. 49), Mawson reading his lectures on Polar exploration (p. 80), Mawson reading Robert Lewis Stevenson (p. 83-84), Madegan reading ‘Lady Betty across the water’ (p. 85), Mawson reading Kipling on the Flag (p. 86), and Mawson reading Robert Service’s The Trail of ‘98 over a few days (p. 89-92). These reading references generally cease with the gradual return of light in August/September.

Douglas Mawson Book List 1911-14

Mawson, Douglas. from Mawson’s Antarctic Diaries.
  • 1911-14 Australasian Antarctic Expedition (Mawson).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Another two-page typed list was prepared for the Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911-14 of which Mawson was the leader; some of those physical books are shown in the Jacka edition of the diaries, the 7th plate following p. 62, depicting Winter Quarters at Cape Denison. The diaries, originally held by the Mawson Institute of Antarctic Research at the University of Adelaide are now a part of the South Australian Museum. . I am most grateful to Mark Pharoah of the South Australian Museum in Adelaide for help in providing copies of the original lists.