p. 31-32: As I work on this essay, over the Christmas of 2015, I know that a copy of my book The Wild Places is being sledge-hauled to the South Pole by a young Scottish adventurer called Luke Robertson, who is aiming to become the youngest Briton to ski there unassisted, unsupported and solo. Robertson’s sledge weighs seventeen stone, and he is dragging it for thirty-five days over 730 miles of snow and ice, in temperatures as low as -50˚C, and winds as high as 100mph. Under such circumstances I felt impossibly proud that The Wild Places (paperback weight: 8.9oz) had earned its place on his sledge, and impossibly excited at the thought of my sentences being read out there on the crystal continent, under the endless daylight of the austral summer.
The Gifts of Reading.
- Arctic Reading: General
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket….
- Whalemen's Reading
Fictional account of mutiny on Grampus, June 1827, followed by rescue by a whaler which sailed nearly to the South Pole. Very little about books, but the cabin of Pym’s friend Augustus contained “a table, a chair, and a set of hanging shelves full of books, chiefly books of voyages and travels” (p. 1021). When Pym, a stowaway, was first hidden before departure he describes his hideaway on p. 1024: “I now looked over the books which had been so thoughtfully provided, and selected the expedition of Lewis and Clarke to the mouth of the Columbia. With this I amused myself for some time, when growing sleepy, I extinguished the light with great care, and soon fell into a sound slumber.” That seems to be the last mention of books in this exciting and inventive tale.
Tammarniitt (mistakes): Inuit Relocation in the Eastern Arctic, 1939-63.
- Arctic Reading: Inuit and other indigenous people
Examines government involvement in Northern Canada which led to relocation of Inuit from the east coast of Hudson's Bay to the high Arctic, the Henik Lake and Garry Lake famines, the establishment of Whale Cove in response to inland famines in the Keewatin, and the second wave of state expansion in the 1950's.
Bering’s Successors, 1745-1780. Contribution of Peter Simon Pellas to the History of Russian Exploration toward Alaska.
- Arctic Reading: Russia
Journal of a Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Performed in the Years 1819-20, in his Majesty’s Ships Hecla and Griper.
- 1819-20 British Voyage of Discovery to the Arctic Regions (Edward Parry aboard Hecla and Griper).
- Arctic Reading: Great Britain
Disappointed at John Ross’s failure to find an open path through the Northwest Passage in 1818, the Admiralty’s John Barrow ordered this important continuation of the search. Continuing explorations eventually morphed into the Franklin Search as well by 1849.
Parry of the Arctic: The Life Story of Admiral Sir Edward Parry 1790-1855.
- Arctic Reading: Great Britain
A biography by his great-great-granddaughter. Only the first half of the book deals with Parry’s Arctic experience.
Shackleton Collection.
- Heroic Age 1901-1921.
- Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
Included in the exhibit were: Tennyson, Alfred Lord. Complete Works. Given in 1908 to Lt. Shackleton and the Officers of the Nimrod, and kept in officer’s mess; Swinburne Poems. Signed by Shackleton; South. First ed. Signed by Shackleton; Nautical Almanac. 1908. Shackleton’s copy from the Nimrod; Inscribed portrait of Shackleton; Signed 1914 solicitation letter for the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition; Signed photograph of Frank Hurley’s Winter Night; Cover illustration of South, presented to a Mrs. Pearson.
Incidents of a Whaling Voyage. To which are Added Observations on the…Sandwich and Society Islands.
- Whalemen's Reading
Olmsted was a passenger aboard the whaler North American [a temperance ship] in 1839, a trip taken as a kind of rest cure for his chronic nervous debility. He returned to Yale for medical school and in fact graduated but died in 1844 after a second voyage.
The Church and the Sailor: A Survey of the Sea-Apostolate Past and Present.
- Arctic Reading: General
Catholic missions to seamen clearly lagged behind the Protestant efforts throughout the 19th century, most Catholic activity as outlined here occurring in the late 19th century and concentrating on the liturgical rather than literary needs of seamen. There was some interest in developing seaman’s institutes, including some reading rooms, but the efforts seem modest at best.
My Antarctic Honeymoon: A Year at the Bottom of the World.
- 1946-48 Ronne Antarctic Research Expedition.
- Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
One of two women on Finn Ronne’s 1947-48 Weddell Sea expedition, the other being Edith Ronne, his wife. A rather unflattering portrayal of Ronne as well as Ronne’s wife, the other woman.
Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo, with a Sketch of Their Habits, Religion, Language and Other Peculiarities….
- Arctic Reading: Canada
Rink’s second volume of Eskimo Tales with his introductory sketch on their culture, based not on ornaments, weapons and other remains: But the time will certainly come when any relics of spiritual life brought down to us from pre- historic mankind, which may still be found in the folk lore of the more isolated and primitive nations, will be valued as highly as those material remains. In this respect the Eskimo may be considered among the most interesting, both as having been almost entirely cut off from other nations and very little influenced by foreign intercourse, and also as representing a kind of link between the aboriginals of the New and the Old World (p. vi). It is a fascinating collection of tales, with brief introductions noting the sources of the stories. Here are a few examples:
Arctic Researches and Life among the Esquimaux: Being the Narrative of an Expedition in Search of Sir John Franklin, in the Years 1860, 1861, and 1862.
- 1848-59 The Franklin Search.
- Arctic Reading: Great Britain
p. xxvii: On the 29th of May [1860], accompanied by Mr. Grinnell and several citizens of New London… [I] entered the boat that was to convey me on board. A few strokes of the oars, however, had only been made, when we returned at the voice of Mr. Haven hailing us. It was to give me a present, in the shape of a little book called “The Daily Food,” which, though small in size, was great in its real value, and which proved my solace and good companion in many a solitary and weary hour.
Obituary: Vilhjalmur Stefansson 1879-1962.
- Arctic Reading: United States
The polar collection that Stef assembled in his later years was initiated by a gift to him of three hundred books by the American Geographical Society. By now the collection, the property of Dartmouth College, numbers some twenty-five thousand bound volumes and forty-five thousand manuscripts, pamphlets, and the like. His widow, the former Evelyn Schwartz Baird, is still its able librarian, and until the end Stef could be seen quietly at work in a corner of the stacks that hold this vast assemblage of polar information.
Before the Heroes Came: Antarctica in the 1890s.
- Antarctic Reading: General
A solid but rather dry account of exploration in Antarctica during the decade before Robert Falcon Scott’s first expedition aboard the Discovery, and centered on Carsten Borchgrevink, his first landing on the Antarctic Continent, and his 1898-1900 Southern Cross expedition. In his concluding chapter, “Lessons not Learned,” Baughman explicitly accuses Clements Markham and Scott of failing to learn the lessons from the previous decade, thus leading to their “heroic” failure. In particular Markham insisted on naval leadership by the wrong people, avoiding scientific expertise, bypassing William Speirs Bruce for Scott, etc.
Safe Return Doubtful: The Heroic Age of Polar Exploration.
- Arctic Reading: General
p. 1: On the night of January 30, 1916, a frail, white-haired gentleman retired to the bedroom of his house in London’s Eccleston Square. Once undressed, he swung expertly into a hammock and, as he had done for more than seven decades, read himself to sleep in traditional Royal Navy fashion: One hand held his book, the other a candle, exactly as he had learned as a midshipman in 1844.