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Reviews tagging 'Confinement'
The Madhouse at the End of the Earth: The Belgica's Journey Into the Dark Antarctic Night by Julian Sancton
15 reviews
directorpurry's review
4.5
Graphic: Terminal illness, Confinement, Medical content, Mental illness, and Animal death
Moderate: Blood
Minor: Animal cruelty
modernhobbitvibes's review
4.0
Graphic: Body horror, Terminal illness, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Confinement, Mental illness, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Chronic illness
Moderate: Violence and Gore
Minor: Racism, Colonisation, and Suicide
Entire book is about survival situations in extreme conditions, including the risk of death by starvation/freezing and explicit death by drowning. There is also discussion of the effects of global warming in the author's notes.defenders_iris's review against another edition
5.0
It really sheds light on the sort of people who set out on these expeditions and what drives them to these feats, as well as how that drive can be their undoing. Frankly, it's the first nonfiction book that made me cry with empathy for their struggles, even knowing the explorers were deeply flawed men with colonist dreams - and being able to balance both of those realities, while also illustrating the progress in the expedition itself, is a feat. Note if you're sensitive to death, especially animal death, I'd avoid this.
I might even purchase a physical copy because it's a phenomenal reference and story.
Graphic: Death and Animal death
Moderate: Confinement
allisonstockslager's review against another edition
4.0
Graphic: Mental illness, Animal death, and Confinement
katieimre's review against another edition
3.5
Graphic: Death and Confinement
singlier's review against another edition
4.0
Julian Sancton 4/5 🏔️s
This nonfiction text tells the story of the Belgica, one of the first expeditions to chart the South Pole led, by Belgian commandment Adrien der Gerlach. Although based on diary entries from the crew (of the 18 man crew, 10 kept diaries of the expedition), the book reads in most cases like a novel: it's not sensationalized, but it approaches it's subject matter with unflinching detail. Centering on the first four officers of the ship, de Gerlach, Roald Amundsen, Frederick Cook, and Georges Lecointe, the book paints a vivid picture of each man, laying out their personalities, drives, goals, and ambitious as they impacted the decisions made throughout the expedition.
See, the Belgica is famous not only for being one of the first ships to map the coast of Antarctica, but for being the first ship to survive a winter in the Antarctic. The extensive record keeping kept by the crew and the ships doctor has made this exploration a case study in human behavior within isolated environments, and has impacted the way humans prepare for space travel, deep sea travel, as well as other forms of extreme isolation. Cook's theories of maintaining mental stability, born out of his experience on the ship, represent some of the first documents indicating a relationship between light and human health (think of seasonal affective disorder). His knowledge of first nations practices of hunting and food preparation are also the main reason his crew survived, and helped legitimize indigenous techniques of health and wellness in the eyes of white scholars during this period.
Overall, I enjoyed this book and learned a lot from it. The amount of research the author put into it really shows in the descriptions of the landscape and the characterization of the men onboard, helping to humanize this story of nearly one hundred years ago.
Moderate: Alcohol, Animal death, Blood, Mental illness, Violence, Confinement, Forced institutionalization, Excrement, Gore, Grief, Gun violence, Suicidal thoughts, Animal cruelty, and Death
mondovertigo's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Medical content, Death, Animal death, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Confinement, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis
Moderate: Animal cruelty
Minor: Child death and Death of parent
spooderman's review
5.0
Graphic: Alcohol, Blood, Body horror, Cursing, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Terminal illness, Torture, Violence, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Colonisation, Confinement, Cultural appropriation, and Death
Moderate: Child death, Sexism, Drug use, Excrement, Racial slurs, and Racism
Minor: Addiction, Infidelity, Cancer, Cannibalism, Child death, and Suicidal thoughts
johnawickline's review
4.75
Graphic: Confinement and Animal death
Moderate: Mental illness and Death
arciz's review against another edition
5.0
Graphic: Animal death, Confinement, and Mental illness
Moderate: Death