Bering’s Voyages An Account of the Efforts of the Russians to Determine the Relation of Asia and America.

Golder, Frank Aldred. Two Volumes. New York: Octogon Books, 1968. [First Published in 1922. American Geographical Society Research Series No. I.].
  • Arctic Reading: Russia
 Preview 

Covers the Log Books and Official Reports of the First and Second Expeditions 1725-1730 and 1733-1742. The reading reported in these volumes is mainly about the voyages themselves, not the kind of recreational reading we find elsewhere.

Thulia: A Tale of the Antarctic.

Palmer, James Croxall. New-York: S. Colman, 1843.
  • 1838-42 U.S. Exploring Expedition (Wilkes).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

A narrative poem about the sailing travails of the US schooner Flying-Fish on the US Exploring Expedition (1838-42). An appendix describes the circumstances that the poem portrays. Basically this is doggerel poetry describing two vessels of the Wilkes Exploring Expedition, the Peacock, and the Flying-Fish. An appendix describes the adventures of the latter ship:

Mariner’s Sketches, Originally Published in the Manufacturers and Farmers Journal, Providence.

Ames, Nathaniel. Revised, Corrected and Enlarged by the author. Providence: Cory, Marshall and Hammond, 1830.
  • Arctic Reading: United States
 Preview 

The author Nathaniel Ames was the son of the statesman, Fisher Ames (1758-1808), of Dedham, Massachusetts, and was a congressman from 1789 to 1797. Nathaniel was named for his grandfather, Nathaniel Ames, famous for the Ames Almanacs, which were the inspiration to Benjamin Franklin's "Poor Richard's Almanac".

Work and Adventures of the Northern Party of Captain Scott’s Antarctic Expedition, 1910-1913.

Priestley, Raymond E. Geographical Journal 43 No. 1(Jan. 1914) 1-14.
  • 1910-14 British National Antarctic Expedition (Scott on Terra Nova).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

p. 11: Every Saturday evening we held a singsong, when every man participated to the best of his ability. Every Sunday we managed to scrape together at least a dozen hymns and a couple of Psalms, and Campbell read us a chapter of the New Testament, of which we had a pocket edition. The other three books we possessed, ‘David Copperfield,’ ‘Simon the Jester,’ and Balfour’s ‘Life of Stevenson,’ were successively read, one chapter a night, by Levick. Every subject of conversation was thrashed out again and again until it was pretty well threadbare, and the only things we were careful to avoid were questions on which either of us had much at heart.

To the Ends of the Earth.

Pease, Francis K. London: Hurst & Blackett, 1935.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

Begins with 1925 cruise to Antarctica aboard Discovery, Scott’s old ship, commanded by Stenhouse. First brought gifts to Tristan da Cunha, including many writing implements, essentially useless to that population, and “a large quantity of Bibles, in which, however, the Tristans displayed very little interest, for the reason…that during the course of the years so many Bibles had been sent to the island that there was now an average of seven copies per inhabitant” (p. 20).

The Speedwell Voyage: A Tale of Piracy and Mutiny in the Eighteenth Century.>

Poolman, Kenneth. New York: Berkley Books, 2000.
  • 1720 British Privateering Voyage (aboard Speedwell).
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

Not a particularly well done account of British privateering in the early 18th century, but it does mention that the Captain of the Speedwell, George Shelvocke, had a few books that guided his navigation, including Captain Woodes Rogers A Cruising Voyage Round the World (London, 1712), and A. F. Frezier’s Voyage to the South Sea and Along the Coasts of Chili and Peru (London, 1706).

The Wreck of the

Dickens, Charles. Golden Mary.By Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins. (New York: Library Publishers, 1956). [Originally published in Household Words, 1856.].
  • Arctic Reading: Great Britain
 Preview 

A compelling tale of shipwreck told by Dickens in the first section, followed by a kind of Decameron of tales told by survivors of the shipwreck as they waited for rescue, and the story of the rescue as told by Collins.

A History of Antarctic Science.

Fogg, G. E. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
  • Antarctic Reading: General
 Preview 

A humanistic study of the development of Antarctic science (not much different from science elsewhere apart from the extreme conditions); as such it constitutes a quite comprehensive history of most Antarctic exploration as well. Antarctic science grows out of mainstream science but has a different relation to politics. Contrasts the “heroic” explorers with the scientists for whom deprivation was no virtue. Fogg defines Antarctic as within the Antarctic Convergence (aka Polar Front), below 50 degrees south, not the 60 degrees of the Antarctic Treaty.

Ice Bound: A Doctor’s Incredible Battle for Survival at the South Pole.

Nielsen, Jerri. New York: Hyperion, 2001.
  • 1998-99 South Pole Winterover (NSF) at Amundsen-Scott Base.
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

This book created considerable controversy by the author going public with her medical condition, despite commitments not to call for special services in case of serious illness. Her cancer was the cause.

Deck and Port; Or, Incidents of a Cruise in the United States Frigate Congress to California

Colton, Walter. . By Rev, Walter Colton, U.S.N. New York: A. S. Barnes, 1856.
  • Arctic Reading: General
 Preview 

p. 16, in Hampton Roads: Sunday, Oct. 26 [1845]. This being the sabbath, we had divine service. The crew were attentive: not the rustle of a hand or foot disturbed the stillness; the speaker’s voice only broke the silence of the deck. The text was the injunction of the prophet, “Go up now, look towards the sea.”

Lands Forlorn: A Story of an Expedition to Hearne’s Coppermine River.

Douglas, George M. By George M. Douglas With an Introduction by James Douglas. (New York, G. P. Putnam’s, 1914). [Reprinted Tucson, AZ: Zancudo Press, 2008].
  • Hudson's Bay Company.
  • Arctic Reading: Canada
 Preview 

p. 45-46, on finding two dead bodies, a dirty note-book, and some carbolic acid: The stench was insufferable, worse than any other form of decomposing animal matter, and blended with it was the peculiarly acrid smell of old smoke from spruce fires. One could remain in that loath some atmosphere only a few minutes at a time; the bodies were in a state of decomposition so advance that it was necessary to break the bunks down and carry them out as they lay. Close to the house on that pleasant point we buried them both in one grave, dug as deep as the frozen ground permitted.

“Antarctic” zwei Jahre in Schnee und Eis am Südpol.

Nordenskjöld, Otto. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 1904.
  • 1901-04 Swedish Antarctic Expedition (Otto Nordenskjöld).
  • Antarctic Reading: Expeditions
 Preview 

The German edition of Nordenskjöld’s book contains several photographs of reading spaces, esp. opp. p. 210, the author at his worktable.