Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage to the Antarctic: Amazon.co.uk: Alfred Lansing: Books

Amazon.co.uk Review

When Alfred Lansing's Endurance was first published in 1959, few people in this country--or anywhere else for that matter--had heard of Shackleton or the Imperial Transantarctic Expedition of 1914. Britain's polar history had been rewritten with Shackleton airbrushed out and Captain Scott taking centre stage as the archetypal English hero who died on the Great Barrier on his long haul back from the South Pole.

If Scott's deification was almost instantaneous, Shackleton's descent into obscurity was more of a slow fade than a sudden death. He achieved a certain amount of acclaim when South, his own account of the Expedition, was published, but his legend seemed to die with him when he suffered a fatal heart attack on another trip south in 1922. His memory deserved much better. Not only was he a far better explorer than Scott, both in terms of his technical and man management capabilities, but the story of the Transantarctic expedition read like an epic out of a Boys Own annual. With his boat crushed, he led his men across the pack-ice, sailed them in open boats to Elephant Island. Once he realised there was no chance of rescue, he and four crew mates sailed a further 600 miles across the southern ocean to South Georgia where they were shipwrecked. The five men then made the first crossing of the island to reach the whaling station at Stromness. Three attempts and three and a half months later, Shackleton returned to Elephant Island to pick up the remaining men. Not a single member of either party was lost.

So we have Lansing to largely thank for Shackleton's rehabilitation. But herein lies the problem. Shackleton's story has been now been so well told both in books--especially Roland Huntford's definitive biography, and in film and TV, that even though Lansing's thrilling account, making liberal use of the diaries of several expedition members, was the first to be published it now feels all terribly familiar and adds nothing to what we already know. Even Frank Hurley's exquisite photographs which illustrate the book now engender a slight feeling of déjà vu--not least because they have already been better reproduced in a single volume published by Bloomsbury. But Lansing deserves his day in the snow and no polar library would be complete without this book. And if, by any chance, you've never previously read a word about Shackleton, this is as good a place as any to start. --John Crace --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Amazon.co.uk Review

You can't really fail with a book about the Endurance. Although Ernest Shackleton's attempt to make the first Trans-Antarctic crossing barely made it out of base camp, his expedition has gone into the history books as one of the great epics of polar travel. Endurance left England in August 1914 and reached the pack-ice off Antarctica in January the following year. It sank in November, crushed by the weight of the ice, leaving Shackleton and his 27 men stranded in one of the most desolate areas of the world with no hope of rescue. Undaunted, Shackleton led his team to the edge of the ice, dragging three open life-boats that had been salvaged from the Endurance every step of the way. They then sailed to Elephant Island, a remote uninhabited outcrop of rock, where they lived off penguins and seagull. By April 1916, Shackleton realised there was no chance of them being spotted by a passing ship and he and five men set sail in the open-decked 20-foot boat, the James Caird, across 650 miles of the stormiest seas of the southern oceans for South Georgia. After narrowly surviving being shipwrecked on the reefs surrounding the western coast of South Georgia, Shackleton then proceeded to make the first-ever crossing of the mountainous island before reaching the sanctuary of the whaling station at Stromness. And it was Shackleton, in person, who led the rescue mission to Elephant Island to pick up the rest of his men. Miraculously, all 28 men survived.

Alfred Lansing's book, first published in 1957, tells it as it was. He draws heavily on the diaries and other first-person memoirs of those involved, and he writes with both style and pace. As such it is the classic tale of derring-do. What Lansing misses, though, is the social context. He provides little sense of history; in August 1914, when the Endurance left England, World War One was starting. By the time he returned home two years later, thousands of young men of his generation were lying dead on the battlefields of the Somme. The contrast is almost unbearable but Lansing makes nothing of it. Similarly he does not explain how someone like Scott, whose South Pole expedition several years earlier had been an unmitigated disaster of incompetence and bad planning, should go down in British history as one of our all-time heroes, while Shackleton, whose exploits were indeed truly heroic, has lived for so long in Scott's shadow. --John Crace --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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29 of 29 people found the following review helpful

"Endurance" from a 14 year old 30 Aug 2003

By A Customer

Format:Hardcover

It seemed right that you should get a younger persons point of view on the book. So here it is.
Every second of this book was breath-taking and the remarkable characters never stopped amazing me with their never ceasing courage and determination to get home. Set during the first World War the crew of the Endurance are forgotton as their ship sinks leaving them stranded on the vast Antarctic ice. For two years the men crossed the ice, living on seals, penguins and dogs. Through vivid diary extracts and accounts you see the adventure through the eyes of the men who struggled through it; you realise how each mans different personalities and qualities succeeded in get the others around him home. The descriptions of the ice and atmosphere of the surrounding countries are amazing and the pictures are breath-taking.
As you read the book you realise Alfred Lansing excellent skill as a writer of accurate events and never loose interest in the risks taken by the crew of the Endurance as they cross ice, the wilest sea in the world and a mountain climbed never before, driven by pure determination and strength of mind.
This book is amazing. Alfred Lansing had true talent.

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18 of 18 people found the following review helpful

If I didn't know it was true... 2 Dec 2003

By Simon Southwell

Format:Paperback

This account of Shackleton's famous expedition reads like a thriller novel. It may lack some technical detail that a student of Antarctica might desire, but it gives full vent to the predicament the party found themselves in, and the inspirational fortitude and courage of their leader. One advantage of this book is that the author had access to surviving expedition members when researching the subject, and the book benefits from these first hand accounts of the persoanlities involved as well as the bleak details of their situation.

As the story unfolds, each step required to get nearer rescue becomes more 'impossible'. Threat of starvation, wintering on ice, breaking ice floes, an incredible boat journey, amputation, crossing impenetrable mountains (the first to do so)---it is all in here. Each phase is a powerful story in itself. It is one of the great stories of the 20th century---up there with the Apollo 13 crew---but these men had no-one except themselves and their determination to get themselves home safely. If you know little or nothing about Shackleton's adventure this is, I think, the best book to introduce the subject. It is the pinnacle of the 'heroic age' adventures, and Alfred Lansing captures the mood beautifully.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful

Endurance-never again complain of being cold,hungry or bored 3 Jun 2000

UK EDITION: Lansing does a great job of conveying life on the ice with Shacklton's team and allows us to meet the men involved. I found myself constantly refering to the nominal role at the front of the book to check who did what. I would have liked even more background on the personalities, if only to stop me briefly hating those whose courage or determination fialed to match the incredible standards set by the others. The author, I'm sure plays down subjects which would normally be life changing- frostbite,hypothermia and malnutrition to name a few. Set in an environment most of us would find hard to imagine and over a priod difficult to comprehend. A fitting way to introduce Shacklton's story in a non academic style but I would love to have seen photo's (especially of the main characters), detailed maps, manifests and technical data relating to the voyage. Shackleton joins the likes of Scott,Mawson and Fiennes in making me feel inspired but insignificant at the same time, every schoolboy should be told this story.