Race for the Pole.

Weems, John Edward. Preface by Vilhjalmur Stefansson. New York: Henry Holt, 1960.
  • 1891-1920 Robert Peary and the Search for the North Pole.
  • Arctic Reading: United States
 Preview 

Generally a whitewash of the Peary legend and legacy (mainly about the 1908-09 expedition) written as a homely narrative based according to Weems on thorough documentation. Although there is a decent bibliography one can’t find documentation for any given passage.

Son of the North.

Roberts, Osseannah. Boston, MA: C. M. Clark Publishing Co., 1908.
  • Arctic Reading: Canada
 Preview 

A fictional romance of North Canada about immigrants from Scotland, with a few reports of reading incorporated into the novel.

Marginalia: Volumes I, II, III, IV, V.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Bollingen edition LXXV. Edited by H.J. Jackson and J.R. de J. Jackson. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1995).
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

Coleridge’s annotations to various works.

With Scott: The Silver Lining.

Taylor, Griffith. Banham, UK: Bluntisham Books, 1997. Reprint of 1916 edition, intro by David Walton.
  • 1910-14 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott on Terra Nova).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Griffith Taylor led the Western Party of Scott’s Terra Nova expedition, scientifically constituting perhaps the most successful part of Scott’s fatal journey.

Review of J. M. Barrie’s Half-Hours,London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1914, and The Voyages of Captain Scott, by Charles Turley, London: Smith Elder, 1914.

London Evening Standard, Nov. 12, 1914.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Anonymous review of an early piece of Scott hagiography: The other book is a memorial of one of the most gallant Englishmen who ever went forth on a high adventure and snatched lasting victory out of failure and death…. Mr. Turley has retold, in Captain Scott’s own words as far as possible, the two great stories, putting them into so convenient a form that no boy or man can be repelled by the presence of detail, scientific or otherwise, inessential to the greatness of the tale.

Frank Wild

Mills, Leif. . Whitby, Yorkshire: Caedmon, 1999.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Frank Wild served widely in Antarctica on various expeditions including the first Scott voyage of Discovery, with Mawson’s 1912-13 expedition, Shackleton’s Imperial Trans-Antarctic attempt with Endurance, and finally taking over Shackleton’s Quest expedition when Shackleton died. His finest achievement was leading the 22 unhappy explorers marooned on Elephant Island in 1916, for the 105 days while Shackleton was struggling to South Georgia. Mills’ book is a sound if somewhat solemn biography of a remarkable leader.

The Zoology of Captain Beechey’s Voyage, Compiled from the Collections and Notes made by Captain Beechey….1825-28.

Beechey, William Frederick. (London: H. G. Bohn, 1839).
  • 1825-28 British Voyage to Pacific Northwest to Meet Captain Franklin at the Bering Straits.
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

After three voyages as a subordinate officer Frederick Beechey was appointed commander of HMS Blossom in 1825 and assigned to the Bering Straits to await the arrival of John Franklin on his second overland expedition to the Mackenzie River Delta and on to the Alaska coast. Although Franklin never arrived (they missed each other by only 200 miles), Beechey and his men employed the time in scientific observation, especially of specimens of fish, crustaceans, and mollusks, some from the South Seas but many from the Arctic waters of Kamchatka and Alaska.

The Daily Journal of an Antarctic Explorer 1956-1958.

Warren, Guyon. Edited by Karen Warren. Nelson, NZ: Copy Press Books, 2014.
  • 1955-58 TAE: Trans-Antarctic Expedition (Fuchs and Hillary).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

Warren was a geologist on the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition (TAE) led by Vivian Fuchs (UK) and Sir Edmund Hillary (NZ). When not on surveying journeys to the Polar Plateau and the Dry Valleys, he was mainly at the Scott Base near McMurdo and he mentions the library at McMurdo a couple of times. His notes about reading occur mainly during the winter period, as outlined here:

Peter Fidler’s Library: Philosophy and Science in Rupert’s Land.

Lindsay, Debra. Readings in Canadian Library History. Edited by Peter F. McNally. (Toronto: Canadian Library Association, 1986). p. 209-29.
  • Hudson's Bay Company.
  • Arctic Reading: Canada
 Preview 

p. 209: Peter Fidler, Hudson’s Bay Company servant [surveyor] 1788-1822, was one of the first owners and collectors of books in Rupert’s Land. His penchant for books was not an isolated case of individualism gone berserk, but his permanent acquisition of vast numbers of books was a unique occurrence in Rupert’s Land…. Fidler’s library eventually reached five hundred volumes, a massive collection for a man of modest means.

Danish Greenland: Its People and Its Products

Rink, Henry. Edited by Dr. Robert Brown. London: Henry S. King, 1877.
  • Arctic Reading: Europe including Scandinavia
 Preview 

p. 168: on training of indigenous boys: The author cannot omit adding one instance to illustrate this. Once he took such a boy with him to Denmark, where he stayed only one winter as apprentice in a printing-office, and acquired a skill in book-printing, lithography, and bookbinding, of which he has afterwards given proofs by managing, all by himself, without the least assistance, a small office in Greenland, the productions of which will be mentioned by and by. This young man is by no means a rare exception; perhaps one out of ten may be found to be equally highly gifted. It cannot be denied that the half-breeds seem to surpass the original race as regards such perfectibility.

Arctic Explorations and Discoveries during the Nineteenth Century. Being Detailed Accounts of the Several Expeditions to the North Seas, both English and American, Conducted by Ross, Parry, Back, Franklin, M’Clure, Dr. Kane, and Others. Including the First Grinnell Expedition….in Search of Sir John Franklin.

Smucker, Samuel Mosheim. New York and Auburn: Miller, Orton & Co., 1858.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Although boredom is something that we have all suffered from at some point in our lives, and has become one of the central preoccupations of our age, very few of us can explain precisely what it is. In this book Lars Svendsen examines the nature of boredom, how it originated, its history, how and why it afflicts us, and why we cannot seem to overcome it by any act of will. A diverse and vague phenomenon, described as anything from 'tame longing without any particular object' (Schopenhauer), 'a bestial and indefinable affliction' (Dostoevsky), to 'time's invasion of your world system' (Joseph Brodsky), boredom allows many interpretations. In exploring these, Lars Svendsen brings together observations from philosophy, literature, psychology, theology and popular culture, examining boredom's pre-Romantic manifestations in medieval torpor, philosophies of the subject from Pascal to Nietzsche, and modern related concepts of alienation and transgression, taking in texts by Samuel Beckett, J. G. Ballard, Andy Warhol and many others. He also puts forward an ethics for boredom, discussing what stance one can adopt towards boredom as well as how one ought not to do so. This book arose from the author's attempt to relax and do nothing. Finding this impossible, he thought it better to do something, so he wrote A Philosophy of Boredom. A witty and entertaining account that considers a serious issue, it will appeal to anyone who has ever felt bored, and wanted to know why.