A History Of Polar Exploration

Author : Nick Rennison
Publisher : Oldacastle Books
ISBN 13 : 1843440911
Total Pages : 124 pages
Book Rating : 4.18/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A Short History of Polar Exploration written by Nick Rennison and published by Oldacastle Books. This book was released on 2014-05-01 with total page 124 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An absorbing history, bringing explorers' tales vividly to life Apsley Cherry-Garrard, one of the men who went to Antarctica with Captain Scott, said "Polar exploration is at once the cleanest and most isolated way of having a bad time that has ever been devised." Yet there has never been a shortage of volunteers willing to endure the bad times in pursuit of the glory that polar exploration sometimes brings. This compelling book tells the memorable stories of the men and women who have risked their lives by entering the white wastelands of the Arctic and the Antarctic, from the compelling tales of Scott, Shackleton, and Amundsen, to lesser known heroes such as Fridtjof Nansen and Robert Peary. This history also looks at the hold that the polar regions have often had on the imaginations of artists and writers in the last 200 years examining the paintings, films, and literature that they have inspired.

Author : Matti Laineman
Publisher : Anova Books
ISBN 13 : 9781844860692
Total Pages : 360 pages
Book Rating : 4.98/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A History of Arctic Exploration written by Matti Laineman and published by Anova Books. This book was released on 2009 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With the character of the Arctic in a dramatic state of flux, and arguments over sovereignty once again rising to the surface, it is timely that a history of the exploration of this remote region be published. Wide-reaching in its scope and beautifully presented with artworks, maps and charts from the Nurminen Foundation and numerous European museums, private collections and archives, this is a full account of the many explorers from both East and West who attempted to find the North-West and North-East Passages, and to chart and document the region to enable the mythical North to gradually take shape and become part of the world picture. The story of man's skill and initiative in bringing an understanding to such an inhospitable part of the globe is described through the daring adventures of Viking sailors such as Erik the Red, navigators Barents and Bering, and explorers of the wilds such as Chelyuskin and Franklin. Equally, the stories of those disasterous voyages in search of the North-West and North-East Passages are presented in detail. The journeys of the great scientific explorers – Cook, Nordenskiold and Amundsen – remind the reader of the bravery of those who set their sights towards the uncharted North. Bravery and endurance were not sufficient for the almost incredible feats of Nansen and Peary. Success in extreme conditions was only achieved by those expeditions that appreciated the ferocity of nature and took example from the indigenous peoples – those who had lived in the North long before the coming of the Europeans.

Author : Shane McCorristine
Publisher : UCL Press
ISBN 13 : 1787352463
Total Pages : 278 pages
Book Rating : 4.69/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Spectral Arctic written by Shane McCorristine and published by UCL Press. This book was released on 2018-05-01 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Visitors to the Arctic enter places that have been traditionally imagined as otherworldly. This strangeness fascinated audiences in nineteenth-century Britain when the idea of the heroic explorer voyaging through unmapped zones reached its zenith. The Spectral Arctic re-thinks our understanding of Arctic exploration by paying attention to the importance of dreams and ghosts in the quest for the Northwest Passage. The narratives of Arctic exploration that we are all familiar with today are just the tip of the iceberg: they disguise a great mass of mysterious and dimly lit stories beneath the surface. In contrast to oft-told tales of heroism and disaster, this book reveals the hidden stories of dreaming and haunted explorers, of frozen mummies, of rescue balloons, visits to Inuit shamans, and of the entranced female clairvoyants who travelled to the Arctic in search of John Franklin’s lost expedition. Through new readings of archival documents, exploration narratives, and fictional texts, these spectral stories reflect the complex ways that men and women actually thought about the far North in the past. This revisionist historical account allows us to make sense of current cultural and political concerns in the Canadian Arctic about the location of Franklin’s ships.

Author : David Thomas Murphy
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
ISBN 13 : 9780803232051
Total Pages : 312 pages
Book Rating : 4.55/5 ( download)

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Download or read book German Exploration of the Polar World written by David Thomas Murphy and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2002-01-01 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: German Exploration of the Polar World is the exciting story of the generations of German polar explorers who braved the perils of the Arctic and Antarctic for themselves and their country. Such intrepid adventurers as Wilhelm Filchner, Erich von Drygalski, and Alfred Wegener are not as well known today as Robert Falcon Scott, Roald Amundsen, Ernest Shackleton, Robert E. Peary, or Richard E. Byrd, but their bravery and the hardships they faced were equal to those of the more famous polar explorers. In the half-century prior to World War II, the poles were the last blank spaces on the global map, and they exerted a tremendous pull on national imaginations. Under successive political regimes, the Germans threw themselves into the race for polar glory with an ardor that matched their better-known counterparts bearing English, American, and Norwegian flags. German polar explorers were driven, like their rivals, by a complex web of interlocking motivations. Personal fame, the romance of the unknown, and the advancement of science were important considerations, but public pressure, political and military concerns, and visions of immense, untapped wealth at the poles also spurred the explorers. As historian David Thomas Murphy shows, Germany's repeated encounters with the polar world left an indelible impression upon the German public, government, and scientific community. Reports on the polar landscape, flora, and fauna enhanced Germany's appreciation of the global environment. Accounts of the indigenous peoples of the Arctic, accurate or fantastic, permanently shaped German notions of culture and civilization. The final, failed attempt by the Nazis to extend German political power to the earth's ends revealed the limits of any country's ability to reshape the globe politically or militarily.

Author : John McCannon
Publisher : Reaktion Books
ISBN 13 : 1780230761
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.64/5 ( download)

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Download or read book A History of the Arctic written by John McCannon and published by Reaktion Books. This book was released on 2013-02-15 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bitter cold and constant snow. Polar bears, seals, and killer whales. Victor Frankenstein chasing his monstrous creation across icy terrain in a dogsled. The arctic calls to mind a myriad different images. Consisting of the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, the United States, Russia, Greenland, Finland, Norway and Sweden, the arctic possesses a unique ecosystem—temperatures average negative 29 degrees Fahrenheit in winter and rarely rise above freezing in summer—and the indigenous peoples and cultures that live in the region have had to adapt to the harsh weather conditions. As global temperatures rise, the arctic is facing an environmental crisis, with melting glaciers causing grave concern around the world. But for all the renown of this frozen region, the arctic remains far from perfectly understood. In A History of the Arctic, award-winning polar historian John McCannon provides an engaging overview of the region that spans from the Stone Age to the present. McCannon discusses polar exploration and science, nation-building, diplomacy, environmental issues, and climate change, and the role indigenous populations have played in the arctic’s story. Chronicling the history of each arctic nation, he details the many failed searches for a Northwest Passage and the territorial claims that hamper use of these waterways. He also explores the resources found in the arctic—oil, natural gas, minerals, fresh water, and fish—and describes the importance they hold as these resources are depleted elsewhere, as well as the challenges we face in extracting them. A timely assessment of current diplomatic and environmental realities, as well as the dire risks the region now faces, A History of the Arctic is a thoroughly engrossing book on the past—and future—of the top of the world.

Author : John McCannon
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 0195114361
Total Pages : 255 pages
Book Rating : 4.62/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Red Arctic written by John McCannon and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1998 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: McCannon also exposes the reality behind these exploits: chaotic blunders, bureaucratic competition, and the eventual rise of the GULAG as the dominant force in the North.

Author : Beau Riffenburgh
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 78 pages
Book Rating : 4.28/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Polar Exploration written by Beau Riffenburgh and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 78 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Take a voyage of discovery into the ¿Heroic Age¿ of polar exploration. During the last quarter of the nineteenth century and the first two decades of the twentieth, explorers from around the world navigated the Northwest Passage and the Northeast Passage, attained the North and South Poles, crossed the Arctic Basin and first flew airships andairplanes in the Arctic and Antarctic, conquering one of nature¿s last, closely guarded bastions. Through facsimile items, Polar Exploration narrates the famous stories of Earnest Shackleton, Douglas M awson and Captain Oates and those less well-known, such as poisonings, mysterious disappearances, false claims, near misses controversies,accusations of cannibalism and the first Antarctic wintering (which drove men to madness).

Author : Ranulph Fiennes
Publisher : Penguin UK
ISBN 13 : 140593803X
Total Pages : 416 pages
Book Rating : 4.37/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Shackleton written by Ranulph Fiennes and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2021-09-16 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover the exhilarating true story of Ernest Shackleton's legendary Antarctic expedition Told through the words of the world's greatest living explorer, Sir Ranulph Fiennes - one of the only men to understand his experience first-hand . . . 'For anyone with a passion for polar exploration, this is a must read' NEW YORK TIMES 'THE definitive book on Shackleton and no one could have done it better . . . an authentic account by one of the few men who truly knows what it's like to challenge Antarctica' LORRAINE KELLY _________ In 1915, Sir Ernest Shackleton's attempt to be the first to traverse the Antarctic was cut short when his ship, Endurance, became trapped in ice. He and his crew should have died. Instead, through a long, dark winter, Shackleton fought back: enduring sub-zero temperatures, a perilous lifeboat journey across icy seas, and a murderous march over glaciers to seek help. Shackleton's epic trek is one of history's most enthralling adventures. But who was he? How did previous Antarctic expeditions and his rivalry with Captain Scott forge him? And what happened afterwards to the man many believed was invincible? In this astonishing account, Fiennes brings the story vividly to life in a book that is part celebration, part vindication and all adventure. _________ 'Fiennes makes a fine guide on voyage into Shackleton's world . . . What makes this book so engaging is the author's own storytelling skills' Irish Independent 'Fiennes relates these tales of exploration and survival, adding insight to Shackleton's journeys unlike any other biographer' Radio Times Praise for Sir Ranulph Fiennes: 'The World's Greatest Living Explorer' Guinness Book of Records 'Full of awe-inspiring details of hardship, resolve and weather that defies belief, told by someone of unique authority. No one is more tailor-made to tell [this] story than Sir Ranulph Fiennes' Newsday 'Fiennes' own experiences certainly allow him to write vividly and with empathy of the hell that the men went through' Sunday Times 'Fiennes brings the promised perspective of one who has been there, illuminating Shackleton's actions by comparing them with his own. Beginners to the Heroic Age will enjoy this volume, as will serious polar adventurers seeking advice. For all readers, it's a tremendous story' Sara Wheeler, The Wall Street Journal

Author : Roald Amundsen
Publisher : Good Press
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 542 pages
Book Rating : 4.66/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The South Pole written by Roald Amundsen and published by Good Press. This book was released on 2023-11-19 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The South Pole is a book by Roald Amundsen and it represents an interesting first-hand account of the Norwegian expedition's successful attempt to reach the South Pole in 1911. Amundsen spends a great deal of time talking about logistics and placing of depots in preparation for his polar attempt all the way from the preparation leading up to the initial sea voyage, the voyage itself and then the establishing of a camp at the Antarctic. Although they were lucky with the weather, and Amundsen attributed the success of the expedition to "good luck", it is obvious that the Norwegian expedition was well prepared and ready for the troubles ahead; the equipment, the sledges with well-trained dogs, the supply depots with seal meat at regular intervals along the route, the sunglasses to avoid snow blindness; it was all thought of in advance.

Author : Richard Sale
Publisher : HarperCollins Publishers
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.70/5 ( download)

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Download or read book To the Ends of the Earth written by Richard Sale and published by HarperCollins Publishers. This book was released on 2002 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text provides an insight into the early history of the Polar regions, and tells the stories of Man's first exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic, and subsequent expeditions. The history of individual Polar expeditions has been told many times, but usually only as personal accounts of individual adventures. This misses the overall context of polar exploration - why the British depended on ponies, or plant-eating animals (on the only continent where plants don't grow), why Franklin's men perished when the local Eskimos were eking out an existence around them (and reporting Franklin's demise), and why the Scandinavians were always better than anybody else.The first map of Antarctica was produced in 1556 - the Vikings visited the Arctic 1,000 years before. In 2001, the US Base at the South Pole is manned 365 days a year. The book tells the whole story of how the two last wildernesses, at either end of the world, were discovered, conquered and tamed.