Antarctica: Exploration, Perception and Metaphor - Hardcover

Simpson-Housley, Paul

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415082250 ISBN 13: 9780415082259

Publisher: Routledge, 1992

Synopsis

A scene so wildly and awfully desolate...it cannot fail to impress me with gloomy thoughts" - so Scott perceived the stark Antarctic landscape in 1905.
Antarctica traces images of the continent from early invented maps of Terra Australis Incognita up to Amundsen's arrival at 90 degrees South. Approaching Antarctica from sea and then land, the book analyses the differing perceptions of beauty and terror experienced by explorers, the stories they brought back and the power of new images refashioned at home.

About this title

Review

"lucidly written, with reader-freindly introductory paragraphs to each of its 10 chapters.... nicely compliments the accounts of the hardy explorers, and, focusing on the environment - which seldom went unnoticed - it is, indeed, a significant contribution in comparative analysis.." -"The Canadian Geographer

Synopsis

A scene so wildly and awfully desolate...it cannot fail to impress me with gloomy thoughts' - so Scott perceived the stark Antarctic landscape in 1905. Ice and isolation dominate the experiences of the Antarctic explorer and find voice in literary interpretation. Yet places are more than physical appearance; expectation and subjective response, as much as direct stimuli, play a part in perceptions of the environment. Antarctica traces images of the continent from early invented maps of Terra Australis Incognita up to Amundsen's arrival at 90 degrees South. Approaching Antarctica from sea and then land, Paul Simpson-Housley describes differing perceptions created by inadequate instrumentation, longitudinal errors, mirage and desire. Explorers returned with images of both beauty and terror. He also analyses their writings in diaries, books and poetry. Developing this theme, and focusing on the realist paintings of Edward Wilson and the symbolic poetry of Coleridge, he discusses how artistic images were created from first-hand experience of the landscape as well as contemporary report and literature.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 1992
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0415082250
• ISBN 13: 9780415082259
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 160