More Winter Reading

[prudenceb]

I just finished "Madhouse at the End of the Earth" by Julian Sancton and highly recommend it.  It tells the story of an 1897 Belgian expedition to Antarctica, in which the Belgica and its 17 crew members overwintered off the coast of Antarctica after becoming stuck in polar ice.  On board are two men who later became famous for real or purported polar exploration accomplishments - Roald Amundsen, who beat Robert Scott in a race to the South Pole, and Frederick Cook, who claimed (likely falsely) to be the first to reach the North Pole.  The book vividly describes the mental and physical toll the experience took on the men.

"The combination of fear and fatigue, depression and disorientation, darkness and isolation, the risk that the Belgica might be crushed in the ice at any moment, a slanted floor that had never leveled out after the formidable pressures of late May and seem to skew reality itself, an infestation of rats, and a ship wide illness with no obvious cause made most of the men feel as if they were losing their grip on sanity."

Cook may have ended up a charlatan and con man (for which he was found guilty and sentenced to years in jail) but he was also a talented physician who correctly diagnosed the mens' physical maladies and likely saved their lives (but took those of many penguins!) with the treatments he prescribed.

I've read a lot of books about polar exploration, but this was all new to me.  Curl up in a nice warm place and read it and enjoy!

 

Prudence

 

[kate]

Library carries the eBook and it is now on my list!

[eneumeier]

My nephew just sent me a copy of this:  https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/489888.The_Frozen_Coast  great gear list in the appendix. We are going to Antarctica in Dec. 2023 and will kayak and camp, but not this route!

Liz