A review by tony_t
The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition by Caroline Alexander

5.0

I read a condensed version of Shackleton's incredible adventure years ago. I think it was a Scholastic paperback I bought through school and the story stuck in my mind even after many years. I was a bit afraid that Caroline Alexander's retelling of the 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition might be a disappointment. I could not have been more wrong. This volume, even more that the one that captured my imagination all those years ago, rekindled my amazement at the 28 men who were part of the most successful failure in the history of polar exploration. Incredible feats of leadership, seamanship, and navigation all captured by superb photography and first-person diaries. As the co-curator of the Shackleton exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, Alexander had unlimited access to the materials from the expedition. The book is beautifully laid out in an 8x9-inch format and liberally augmented with the Frank Hurley photographs from the expedition. I highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in polar exploration or stories of men persevering over incredible odds.