Shackleton [antikvár]

Preface This book grew out of my work on Scott and Amundsen, for at every other turn the shadow of Ernest Shackleton fell across my path. Shackleton was more than a polar explorer; he was a hero, and a popular hero, of his own times. Under any circumstances, a biography seemed due. Only two have so far appeared, the last, by James and Margery Fisher, nearly thirty years ago. Since then, public records have been opened, new material has emerged. That includes the diaries of Shackleton's followers. They are notably those of Sir Edgeworth David, Commander Lionel Greenstreet, Frank Hurley, Keith Jack, Ernest Joyce, iEneas Mackintosh, Sir Douglas Mawson, Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Hans Orde-Lees, the Rev. Arnold Spencer-Smith. Other diaries of note have been those of Roald Amundsen, C. A. Larsen and Otto Nordenskjöld. Before the age of air travel and universal radio, polar expeditions were essays in isolation. The participants were exclusively their own chroniclers. In piecing their story together, the proper foundation is obviously the private journal, even if written with an eye to publication. At the very least, it is free of hindsight. It breaches inhibition. Quotations do duty for historical dialogue. It produces an immediacy otherwise hard to achieve, but different viewpoints are desirable for a rounded picture of people and events. Historical authenticity is all. For that reason, contemporary place-names have been used in ''' r i this book. What is nowadays known as the Ross Ice Shelf appears as the Ross Ice Barrier or the Great Ice Barrier. Leningrad is called St Petersburg or, later, Petrograd. Oslo will be found as Christiania or Kristiania. Baia-Mare, now in Romania, reverts to Nagybanya in Hungary. Similarly, in quoting from diaries and letters, the original spelling and punctuation have been left untouched. In units of measurement, too, the sources have been followed. Thus, altitudes appear in feet. The nautical (or geographical) mile has been used for polar land travel. Temperatures are given, not in Centigrade, but Fahrenheit. The pound sterling is the old, predecimalised kind. Conversions will be found later in the book, on page 701. J) I t XIX