The Last Place on Earth (Modern Library Exploration) (Paperback)

~ (Author), Paul Theroux (Introduction) "On the morning of November 1st, 1911, a little cavalcade left Cape Evans in the Antarctic, straggled over the sea ice and faded into the..." (more)
Key Phrases: depot journey, polar party, polar journey, Sir Clements, Terra Nova, South Pole (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

On December 14, 1911, the classical age of polar exploration ended when Norway's Roald Amundsen conquered the South Pole. His competitor for the prize, Britain's Robert Scott, arrived one month later--but died on the return with four of his men only 11 miles from their next cache of supplies. But it was Scott, ironically, who became the legend, Britain's heroic failure, "a monument to sheer ambition and bull-headed persistence. His achievement was to perpetuate the romantic myth of the explorer as martyr, and ... to glorify suffering and self-sacrifice as ends in themselves." The world promptly forgot about Amundsen.

Biographer Ronald Huntford's attempt to restore Amundsen to glory, first published in 1979 under the title Scott and Amundsen, has been thawed as part of the Modern Library Exploration series, captained by Jon Krakauer (of Into Thin Air fame). The Last Place on Earth is a complex and fascinating account of the race for this last great terrestrial goal, and it's pointedly geared toward demythologizing Scott. Though this was the age of the amateur explorer, Amundsen was a professional: he left little to chance, apprenticed with Eskimos, and obsessed over every detail. While Scott clung fast to the British rule of "No skis, no dogs," Amundsen understood that both were vital to survival, and they clearly won him the Pole.

Amundsen in Huntford's view is the "last great Viking" and Scott his bungling opposite: "stupid ... recklessly incompetent," and irresponsible in the extreme--failings that cost him and his teammates their lives. Yet for all of Scott's real or exaggerated faults, he understood far better than Amundsen the power of a well-crafted sentence. Scott's diaries were recovered and widely published, and if the world insisted on lionizing Scott, it was partly because he told a better story. Huntford's bias aside, it's clear that both Scott and Amundsen were valiant and deeply flawed. "Scott ... had set out to be an heroic example. Amundsen merely wanted to be first at the pole. Both had their prayers answered." --Svenja Soldovieri

Review

"A remarkably vivid picture of the agonies and feuds, as well as joys,
of polar exploration . . . a fascinating book."--The New York Times

"An extraordinarily rich reading experience."--Los Angeles Times

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the South Pole was the most coveted prize in the fiercely nationalistic modern age of exploration. In this brilliant dual biography, the award-winning writer Roland Huntford reexamines every detail of the great race to the South Pole between Britain's Robert Scott and Norway's Roald Amundsen. Scott, who died along with four of his men only eleven miles from his next cache of supplies, became Britain's beloved failure, while Amundsen, who not only beat Scott to the Pole but returned alive, was largely forgotten. This account of their race is a gripping, highly readable history that captures the driving ambitions of the era and the complex, often deeply flawed men who were charged with carrying them out.

The Last Place on Earth is the first of Huntford's masterly trilogy of polar biographies. It is also the only work on the subject in the English language based on the original Norwegian sources, to which Huntford returned to revise and update this edition.

Roland Huntford is the former Scandinavian correspondent for the London Observer. He is the bestselling author of two critically acclaimed biographies of Ernest Shackleton and Fridtjof Nansen as well as the novel Sea of Darkness. He lives in Cambridge, England.

Jon Krakauer is the author of Into Thin Air, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and Into the Wild. His work has appeared in many magazines, including Outside, Smithsonian, and National Geographic. He chose the books in the Modern Library Exploration series for their literary merit and historical significance--and because he found them such a pleasure to read. -- Review

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 640 pages
• Publisher: Modern Library (September 7, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375754741
• ISBN-13: 978-0375754746
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (78 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #104,119 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #8 in	Books > History > Europe > Norway
  #15 in	Books > History > Australia & Oceania > Polar Regions
  #58 in	Books > History > World > Expeditions & Discoveries

• This item is part of The Modern Library Exploration Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

49 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars What really happened, April 3, 2000

By	John L. Velonis (Dobbs Ferry, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I recently read "Scott's Last Expedition", the edited version of his diaries from his South Pole expedition. This left me interested but unfulfilled: I wanted to learn more about Amundsen and the context for both expeditions, and to get more analysis of the bald facts as related in Scott's diaries. So I turned to Huntford's "The Last Place on Earth".

I was not disappointed. Huntford narrates the entire lives of both Amundsen and Scott, with edifying discursions on Nansen, Shackleton, and other Polar explorers. Huntford knows Norwegian and thus was able to consult primary sources for Amundsen's expedition directly; he provides many excerpts from the letters and diaries of both British and Norwegian expedition members. He also reveals some of the omissions in the edited version of Scott's diaries.

As a minor quibble, Huntford only rarely gives full dates, so that I found myself frequently having to page back a considerable way to remind myself which year or even which month it was. An appendixed chronology would have been immeasurably helpful.

As other reviewers have noted, the author is highly critical of Scott -- occasionally unfairly so, as when he notes that Scott's first depot journey brought "a ton of supplies not quite to 80 degrees South" where Amundsen's party had "moved three tons another two degrees of latitude closer to the Pole", omitting to mention that Amundsen started about a degree farther south than Scott. But from the evidence Huntford adduces, even without his interpretations, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Scott was criminally unprepared, negligent, and generally incompetent. It is not as though he had no information about what he would be facing -- his previous expedition encountered nearly all the same problems, but he seems not to have learned anything from it. Huntford shows how Scott's diaries and their careful editing combine to portray Scott in a much more favorable light than he deserves -- a case of the loser writing the history books.

Huntford also reveals what might charitably be called "traditional" attitudes toward women. For example, speaking of Kathleen Bruce, Scott's future wife, Huntford says, "She was a predatory female; more predatory than usual, that is." Fortunately, since nearly all the principal figures in the book are male, this only surfaces occasionally, as when Huntford describes Amundsen as having "an almost feminine sensitivity for the undertones and cross-currents on which a leader has to play".

Despite its flaws, "The Last Place on Earth" should be among the first books you read on Polar exploration, or true-life adventure in general. Once the race for the Pole was on, I found it as hard to put down as any fictional thriller.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars an absolute must-read, January 22, 2001

By	Tina Morris "schultheiss" (Rockville, MD USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

There are many reasons to read this book. For one, it is very well written. It is equally well-researched, and although it talks about events that happened 90 years ago, every modern explorer or wanna-be explorer should read it. Huntford's book "The last Place on Earth" brilliantly reveals the true story of the race to the South Pole between Roald Amundsen and Robert Falcon Scott. In terms of Scott it is a myth-shattering account that tells the time-less story of arrogance, unpreparedness in the face of danger and lack of respect for the forces of nature that ultimately lead to inevitable desaster and failure. And if anybody thinks that this theme is outdated, please read the stories of the recent tragedies on Everest. Huntford analyzes very carefully the fundamentally different approaches that went into the preparation and execution of both expeditions and lead to the so different outcomes: success and safe return for the Norwegians, death and suffering for the British. Huntford finds the roots for Scott's arrogant and at the same time helpless approach in Edwardian society. He also shows us the very different situation that Amundsen was coming from. In spite of the large amount of detail presented, the book reads very, very well, almost like an adventure novel. Huntford has been criticized for his sharp bashing of Scott and his myth, but after reading the details and doing some further research on both expeditions I have to say that it was time that Amundsen got the full respect he deserved and the truth about Scott, the "hero" was told.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Riveting but blatantly biased, March 9, 2003

By A Customer

"The Last Place on Earth" (formerly published as "Scott and Amundsen") is Roland Huntford's version of what he calls "the last great voyage of terrestrial discovery" -- the race to be the first person to reach the South Pole in the early 20th century. Huntford weaves a gripping tale of how Roald Amundsen and Robert Scott planned their separate expeditions, laid in supplies, navigated and finally reached the holy grail of 90° South. Amundsen beat Scott to the Pole by a month and returned home to a hero's welcome. Scott and his team, on the other hand, died on the way back from the Pole, and their bodies were discovered months later. It's quite a tale, and Huntford tells it in such a way as to keep the reader engrossed and riveted. Unfortunately, he cannot keep his admiration for Amundsen or his contempt for Scott concealed or even low-key.

In every page, Amundsen is presented as a polar genius, who soaked up knowledge and used it to guarantee (as much as possible) a safe journey to the Pole and back. He develops his own rations and spends endless time fine-tuning his equipment. He uses a pattern of Eskimo clothing to keep warm and dry. He depends on seal meat to ward off scurvy, and brings along far more food and fuel than he actually needs. Generally, he knows exactly what he's doing.

In stark contrast, Scott is depicted as a world-class buffoon, who acheived his station in life through connections rather than talent. Every action he takes is shot through with disaster, from the way he designed his sledges to the rations he took. And let's not even talk about his attempt at going to the Pole with ponies instead of sledge dogs. According to Huntford, he can't do anything right, and he pays for it with his life and the lives of the four men he took to the Pole with him. (His depiction of Scott resulted in Scott's son angrily and publicly disowning the book, once he saw what the author had done to his father's reputation.)

"The Last Place on Earth" is a story of adventure and foolhardiness, life and death in the cold, snowy wastes of Antarctica. The reader, however, is urged to keep the author's bias in mind.