ENDURANCE by Alfred Lansing

In 1914 Sir Ernest Shackleton and a crew of 27 men set sail for the South Atlantic on board a ship called the Endurance. The object of the expedition was to cross the Antarctic overland. In October 1915, still half a continent away from their intended base, the ship was trapped, then crushed in ice. For five months Shackleton and his men, drifting on ice packs, were castaways on one of the most savage regions of the world. This utterly gripping book, based on firsthand accounts of crew members and interviews with survivors, describes how the men survived, how they lived together in camps on the ice for 17 months until they reached land, how they were attacked by sea leopards, had to kill their beloved dogs whom they could no longer feed, the diseases which they developed (an operation to amputate the foot of one member of the crew was carried out on the ice), and the extraordinary indefatigability of the men and their lasting civility towards one another in the most adverse conditions conceivable.

Review

One of the most remarkable tales of human courage and determination. The story is gripping and the book is a classic of its kind — Sir Ranulph Fiennes

A superb and very readable account of the greatest survival story of all time — Sir Chris Bonington

One of the most harrowing survival stories of all time — Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm

Book Description

Adventure, shipwreck, storms and survival on the high seas.

About the Author

Alfred Lansing was a native of Chicago. After serving more than five years in the Navy, he enrolled at North Western University, Illinois and majored in journalism. Until 1949 he edited a weekly newspaper in Illinois. He then joined the United Press and in 1952 became a freelance writer. Endurance was his first book. He died in 1975.

Frank Hurley was an Australian photographer. From 1911-14 he accompanied Douglas Mawson on his Australasian Antarctic Expedition and was one of the party that sledged to the South Pole. On his return he was recruited for Shackleton’s trans-Antarctic expedition. He died in Sydney in 1962 at the age of 71.