The Frozen Ship: The Histories and Tales of Polar Exploration

Wow. I really liked this book. I have a nearly bottomless appetite for tales of polar exploration and adventure on the high seas. And the worse an expedition goes, the more fascinating reading it is. That's why this book is so great. Sarah Moss undertakes a literary overview of the last 1,000 years of polar exploration (No kidding, going back way past the middle ages, even!), covering a huge range of writings about various expeditions, arctic and antarctic, successful and unsuccessful. Reading this book, I got a full sense of the technical difficulties (and foolhardy personalities) behind these often quixotic journeys. Well-organized and exceptionally well-researched, this was probably the most entertaining book I have read about trips to earth's most desolate regions, and I've read quite a few. The only sections I didn't care for were the small ones about poetry and fiction based on real arctic explorations, but even these sections held some real nuggets, like the part about "Frankenstein". These sections constitute only a tiny section of the book, and I feel bad for even complaining, as the book is such a great overall read. I should also note that since this book covers and talks about so many other books about polar exploration, it serves as a great guide for the whole genre. After reading this book, I immediately ordered another book mentionned in this book.

Sarah Moss (Lecturer in American and English literature) presents The Frozen Ship: The Histories and Tales of Polar Exploration presents true stories of Arctic and Antarctic voyagers who dared to make dangerous and often fatal journeys to the icebound poles. Chronicling explorers, missionaries, and archaeologists ranging from Viking settlers and Renaissance conquerors to modern-day scientists, The Frozen Ship also reflects upon morbid global cultural fascination with expeditions that went horribly wrong, and the powerfully romanticized appeal of the frozen polar landscapes and the drive to plant flags in ice. A skillfully researched and smoothly presented chronicle of man versus nature throughout the centuries.