The Heart of the Antarctic

Being the Story of the British Antarctic Expedition, 1907-1909. First trade edition. 2 vols. Numerous illustrations etc. Good original cloth, spines faded, slightly cocked, corners bumped, slight splitting to cloth at rear joint of vol 2. Top edge gilt. Contemporary gift inscriptions in ink to ffep of both vols. xlviii, 372; xvi, [errata slip], 419pp. London, Heinneman,

With a touching inscription to the ffep of the first volume: " To his darling Millicent [Burry Turner] from her loving Daddie who presided at Sir Ernest Shackleton's lecture at Crystal Palace Dec 6 09. Xmas 1909." 

 

This first trade edition was issued in the same year as the deluxe edition, and produced from the same typeset. This impressive publication is the official narrative of the 1907-1909 British Antarctic Expedition in the ship Nimrod. Captained by Sir Ernest Shackleton, though the expedition did not fulfil its objective of reaching the South Pole, it did set a new Farthest South and achieve the first ascent of Mount Erebus. The expedition members occupied themselves over the long Antarctic winter with writing, printing and binding a book, the Aurora Australis, an extraordinary achievement and one of the great highspots of Antarctic book collecting. 

 

Spence, 1097; Rosove, 305.B1.

Stock Code: 213537