Ring of Ice: True Tales of Adventure, Exploration, and Arctic Life [Hardcover]

Peter Stark (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 2000

Well into the nineteenth century Arctic explorers believed that they needed only to smash their ships through a ring of ice circling the top of the globe and from there they could tack easily on soft breezes to the North Pole. Acting on this belief, these adventurers were crushed by ice, wasted by scurvy, and frozen to death on the ice floes. This European notion of the Arctic as a ring surrounding a void not only lured countless sailors to their deaths but also had the effect of drowning out the voices and visions of the native Arctic people. Now this vibrant collection celebrates both the unheard voices of the Arctic peoples and the trail of words left by the Europeans who pushed forward to fill the hole in their knowledge of the world. Spanning the years from 1741 to the present, Ring of Ice presents many such works, including the story of Captain Tyson and his crew who, marooned by their own shipmates, were forced to float precariously on a tiny iceberg for five months before being rescued. And the tale of Duncan Pryde, a fur-trader employed by Hudson's Bay Company, who finds himself unwittingly caught up in the Inuit tradition of wife exchange. Juxtaposed with these European tales are stories of survival, skill, and daily life among the Eskimos, as told through dozens of native poems and legends as well as by some of today's most promising writers, including Finn Lynge and Rachel A. Qitsualik. Enriched by the writings of Richard K. Nelson, Gretel Ehrlich, Barry Lopez, Sir John Franklin, and classics such as Gontran de Poncins' Kabloona and Adolphus Greely's Three Years of Arctic Service, Ring of Ice is a comprehensive and altogether unique anthology representing the colorful history that pervades this monochromatic landscape. (61/4 X 91/4, 468 pages)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

From the time of the ancient Greeks until the 19th century, European explorers imagined that beyond the ring of ice that encircled the Arctic lay a warm, calm sea that would take them to the Orient. Instead of this easy Northwest Passage, notes Peter Stark, those explorers found what the Inuit and Eskimo inhabitants of the region knew they would: "ice, ice, and more ice."

In this well-chosen anthology, Stark offers a documentary history of changing views of the Arctic over the last two and a half centuries. His collection begins with the words of Georg Wilhelm Steller (for whom many Arctic animal species are named), who accompanied the star-crossed Danish explorer Vitus Bering across the far northern Pacific. The memoirs of other explorers follow, intermingled with prose and poetry from the indigenous peoples of the region. Most of those explorers, like the unfortunate American surveyor Adolphus Greely and the Italian aviator Umberto Nobile, recount wrong decisions taken in the face of horrendous circumstances, whether howling gales or the madness of companions. Few of their stories end happily, save that their narrators usually survived. The closing pages of Stark's anthology are given over to a new kind of explorer, the literary naturalist, whose greatest exemplar is Barry Lopez (Arctic Dreams).

Students of the history of exploration and the peoples of the Arctic will find Stark's book to be an engaging survey. --Gregory McNamee

Review

Vivid, frigid, and often bloody....a fine re-presentation of Arctic annals, past and present. -- Booklist

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 468 pages
• Publisher: The Lyons Press; 1st edition (June 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1558215379
• ISBN-13: 978-1558215375
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,448,782 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Meaning of Ice, February 1, 2002

By 

Jena Ball "Jena Ball" (North Carolina, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Ring of Ice: True Tales of Adventure, Exploration, and Arctic Life (Hardcover)

If you are intrigued by the allure that the Arctic has for some people, or are yourself unable to resist subzero weather at the top of the world, then Ring of Ice is a must. Stark has collected a truly diverse range of stories beginning with the comedy of errors endured by Georg Wilhelm Stellar, the German-born scientist aboard Vitus Bering's 1741 Russian expedition to the North American coast, and ending with the luminous prose of modern Artic explorers such as Barry Lopez.

Stark's informative introductions to each essay are both helpful and amusing. He has also sought to balance the primarily European writers and their points of view with those of the native Inuit people by preceding each essay with an Inuit poem. "The poems emphasize the Inuit ethic of sharing, egalitarianism, and incessant hunting, as well as the simple joys and fears of life." They are, of course, in sharp contrast to the accounts of the European explorers, who sought to conquer rather than work with nature, and usually perished as a result.

The book is divided into 4 sections (called books), but the progression of pieces is linear. The 1998 piece entitled "Tale of a Hunter's Daughter," is so pignantly written and captures the feeling of both the land and the woman struggling to make her way in it, that it is worth the price of the whole book. Of course there are other stand-outs, including "How Dr.Hayes Learned to Love Seal Blubber," "Nansen Strolls Farthest North," and "Cold Oceans: By Sea Kayak to Greenland."

Oddly enough, the poetry, which I thought was an excellent idea, is made inaccessible and difficult to read by the fact that it has been set in a script font that is too small to read comfortably. As a result, your eyes naturally gravitate towards the correctly sized, regular fonts used in the essays. This is really strange, given the time and effort that obviously went into the rest of the book, and I hope that Stark has made a very loud stink. It's hard to make yourself work at reading the poetry, which by its nature takes a little bit of work to appreciate. Otherwise a fine collection.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful book!, May 23, 2001

By 

RDM "RDM" (Juneau, AK USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ring of Ice: True Tales of Adventure, Exploration, and Arctic Life (Hardcover)

This is a wonderful book! Peter Stark has selected an extraordinary collection of vignettes from a wide range of original writings about the Arctic and its explorers. I've read many (but certainly not all) of his sources in their entirety, and enjoyed re-reading extracts of those that I have read before as much as I enjoyed reading for the first time those that were new to me. Stark has a fine eye, an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Arctic and a gift for weaving together these many tales into a fine, telling tapestry of Arctic adventure. Terrific!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For any collection covering world exploration, February 19, 2001

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Ring of Ice: True Tales of Adventure, Exploration, and Arctic Life (Hardcover)

Over the last two centuries expeditions have penetrated the Arctic and brought back important information - if they returned at all. This provides true stories of Arctic exploration and adventure, presenting the journals, letters and firsthand experiences of the explorers and natives of the region alike. An excellent addition for any collection covering world exploration.