Antarctic Navigation

by Elizabeth Arthur

'A classic heroic quest ... absolutely fresh and engrossing. Reading the book becomes a kind of quest itself, after which the world will never again look the same' 
San Francisco Chronicle
 
'A vast and beautifully written book ... reads like a wonderful Victorian novel, weaving historical and contemporary dramas with rich sub-plots and vivid descriptions of the harsh landscape' 
Vogue
 
'A brilliant storyteller, Arthur spins this epic tale of adventure, passion, endurance and courage which has a grip that's impossible to resist' 
Woman & Home
 
'In the dazzling landscape of the highest, driest, coldest place on earth, the detail and descriptions of the ice and the expedition she undertakes on the Scott trail are brilliant ... An excellent read' 
Choice

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Adventure, Travel, Novels, Contemporary, Literary Fiction

798 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Elizabeth Arthur was born on November 15, 1953 in New York City. She is the daughter of Robert Arthur, a fantasy, horror and mystery writer and the creator of The Three Investigators mystery book series for young people. She was educated at Concord Academy in Concord, Massachusetts, the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, Notre Dame University of Nelson, British Columbia, and the University of Victoria in Victoria, B.C.

Her first book, Island Sojourn - a memoir about building a house on a wilderness island in northern Canada - was published in 1980 by Harper and Row. A second memoir, Looking For The Klondike Stone, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1993. She has also published five novels - Beyond the Mountain (Harper and Row, 1983), Bad Guys (Knopf, 1986), Binding Spell (Doubleday 1989), Antarctic Navigation (Knopf, 1995), and Bring Deeps (Bloomsbury U.K., 2003).

Athur's novel Antarctic Navigation - an 800-page epic narrated by an American woman who sets out to recreate Robert Falcon Scott's British Antarctic Expedition of 1910-1912 - was chosen by the New York Times as a Notable Book, received a Critics' Choice Award from the San Francisco Review of Books, and was chosen as a Best Book of 1995 by A Common Reader. In 1996 the novel received the Ohioana Book Award for Fiction from the Ohioana Library Association.

These awards came on the heels of two NEA Fellowships, as well as an operational support grant from the Division of Polar Programs at the National Science Foundation - the first ever given to a fiction writer.

Arthur has taught creative writing at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, the University of Cincinnati, and Indiana University/Purdue University of Indianapolis - where she directed the creative writing program. She has been married to the writer and editor Steven Bauer since June of 1982, and the two of them have recently completed twenty-six books in a contemporary Three Investigators mystery book series, updated for a new generation of readers.

Reviews

[Paul Weiss · Rating 4 out of 5]

A unique combination of science, outdoors and social commentary!

ANTARCTIC NAVIGATION is the fictionalized biography of Morgan Lamont, seemingly destined from birth (or perhaps a better description might be obsessively driven) to recreate the sadly doomed 1910 Antarctic expedition of British naval officer, Robert Falcon Scott. Arthur painstakingly builds Lamont's character and the development of her mind from a confused, almost abused child to an exquisitely socially aware scientist, who despite the shortcomings in her management of her love life and inter-personal relationships manages to lead the Ninety South Expedition to a successful albeit seriously flawed conclusion.

If Dickens were alive to write a novel today, ANTARCTIC NAVIGATION would be the type of novel he would be pleased to produce for his readers - an almost intimidatingly lengthy social commentary woven into the histories of colourful characters that are neither heroes nor villains but each of whom are described, with all of their flaws or virtues in astonishing depth and detail. But, unlike Dickens, Arthur has also taken the time to add an extraordinary level of detail of science from both arcane unrelated fields of endeavour such as quantum field theory, animal psychology, volcanology, geology, glaciation and meteorology (to name only a few) as well as a wonderfully informative treatise on the state of scientific research in the Antarctic. The science is sometimes served up in the form of almost spiritual, strangely compelling metaphors but it is also often handed out in direct doses when it is pertinent to the exciting and dramatic movement of Morgan and her expedition to their goal at 90° South. I would also happily add that, when it comes to narrative description of the landscape, scenery and the beauty of the natural world, the likes of Aldo Leopold, John Muir, Edward Abbey or Henry David Thoreau have got nothing on Elizabeth Arthur's skills as a wordsmith.

Although ANTARCTIC NAVIGATION is not an easy read, and it certainly is a long one, there are many words that come to mind as I came to the close of its final page - lyrical, poetic, mesmerizing, informative, compelling, thought-provoking, disturbing and yet strangely peaceful, and, of course, pleasing and enjoyable. It wasn't quite the hard driving, totally outdoors focused expedition reading that I was expecting, but there was more than enough to fill that particular need. For the rest of it, ANTARCTIC NAVIGATION was a thoroughly enjoyable novel that now occupies a place of honour on my bookshelves.

Highly recommended.

Paul Weiss

[Margaret · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the monumental reading experiences of my life, and I’m not sure I can say exactly why, but when I look back at my reading landscape it looms up like a giant ice mountain. It is long. It is sprawling. It is diffuse and discursive, with an author who thinks nothing of veering off for pages at a time to talk about some tangential fact or anecdote that’s caught her attention. And it is unforgettable. The spine of it is the story of a young woman who becomes fascinated by British Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott and his doomed expedition to the South Pole. Soon she’s obsessed, Ahab-like, with the idea that the Scott expedition could have succeeded, and in the way that Scott planned it (ponies, man-hauling), had various things not happened or happened differently, and soon she’s planning to recreate the expedition herself to prove she’s right and vindicate Scott’s intention. Along the way there are excursions into philosophy, environmental science, gender politics, the nature of leadership, physics, ancient Greek history, the very British phenomenon of the noble disaster (which indeed they often seem to prefer to the more mundane glories of a success), and some of the most sublime nature writing you will ever read about the strange, bleak beauty of the Antarctic landscape. Arthur was the first fiction writer to receive a grant from the National Science Foundation, which she used to get firsthand experience of life at the bottom of the world, and her descriptions of it are luminous and evocative. (She is sometimes also very funny – her description of the trip to McMurdo Sound from New Zealand on a military transport is s little comic masterpiece.) This is a book that offers both the literal adventure of its primary story line and the intellectual adventure of keeping up with the author’s mercurial, multi-disciplinary mind. When you finish it, you know that you’ve been on a journey and something profound has happened to you, although you may not know what until later. Exhausting. Exhilarating. Magic.

[Kay · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite book of all time! I am a reader, and this book moved me as no other book ever has.It is fiction but had every element I would ever be interested in reading about in an adventure story; every aspect of the science of Antartica, from the geology to atmospheric physics, world ecology to politics. The strong main female character's philosophy and the beautiful style of writing. In 1990 she was the first novelist selected for participation in the Antartic Artists and Writers Program and has twice been recognized with fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts. This shows the author's abilitiy to write- and I felt I was there in the story, all 800 pages.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love anything about polar climates, but what really draws me to this book is the strong female lead character and the fact that the book is 800 pages long. I really appreciate a well developed story that covers the course of a character's lifetime (or at least a good chunk of it!). Plus the author won one of the first National Science Foundation grants for writing and was able to travel to Antarctica for her research.

[Barbara · Rating 2 out of 5]

At first I enjoyed this book for its soothing qualities. I thought, ah, this is a nice, simple story about somebody's life, basically told in chronological order. I can appreciate that. It's about a woman explorer who has been destined since birth to go to the South Pole. Promising. Also, my dad gave this book to me in 1996 with a sweet note inside wishing me "a good life's travels" and I somehow hadn't ever read it. (Maybe the fact that it's 800 pages has something to do with it? Not that that's stopped me from reading lots of other tomes though!)

But as the book wore on, I got tired of a certain kind of naiveté, long-windedness and contrived feeling to the plot. The thing that really sent me over the edge was the fact that Morgan's racist, sexist grandfather gives her $10 million for her expedition, and that she and the team accept this because they just like him in spite of it. Also, Morgan's idea of making sure that the expedition team be 1/3 women is just bizarre, for somebody who fancies herself a feminist. And finally, her exoticization and lumping together of all non-Western religion and philosophy is eye-rollingly bad.

Anyway, I skim finished the book after about page 450. It was fun to get some sense of what it's like to visit Antarctica, but I probably didn't need to read this book to do that.

[Jill Hessey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished reading Antarctic Navigation for what I think is the fourth time. I was so happy to see it finally become available as a digital e-book.

I would rank it among my top five favorite novels read as an adult. In Morgan Lamont you will find a truly unique female protagonist. There are no others that I know of like her.
The story is compelling, the prose evocative and often lyrical.
In the first several pages you will find a description of the birth experience that is so memorable you will forever cite it to others when describing the book.

To enjoy an 800 page novel as much on the fourth reading as you did on the first speaks to its quality. The novel can bog down when the author detours into philosophical side trips, but then you realize that these are frequently things you need to hear. It is more than a little heartbreaking that the theme of the human relationship to the earth and the grips to which we must come to correct that path and preserve this beautiful planet are as resonant today as they were when the novel was published thirty years ago. Maybe even more so.

I am in my sixties and this may or may not be the last time I go on this journey with Morgan and her equally fascinating colleagues and companions. I hope not.
It is a commitment, but well worth the hours you will spend in their company.

[Randi Friedman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book back in the summer of 1996 or 1997 as a random pull off a library shelf. Long after the novel had been returned, the title and author had unfortunately been forgotten, the story remained with me. The vivid language of the landscape brought me to Antarctica and had me shivering as I read. I am always a fan of a story with adventure and new experiences. Antarctic Navigation was transformative. I believe I saw my own possibilities and future adventures in a new light. Since then I have tried to live my life setting obstacles and adventures in my path deliberately and am overjoyed at each accomplishment. Thankfully powerful search engines has enabled me to find this incredible book again.

[Don · Rating 5 out of 5]

A marvelous tale of adventure, family life and struggles, and the fulfillment of a dream. Its major characters are real, the love (and love lost) situations are both hearwarming and heart-breaking, and the vastness of the Antarctic continent will stay with you for years. Recommended to all who love adventure stories, and the mind-set of people who truly work to see their dreams come true. A splendid read.

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is magic. I lived inside it and did not want to leave. There should be a kindle edition as it is not easy to relax with an 800 page paperback with tiny type. But I read it anyway. Hope Davis should narrate an Audible version. I want to re-read it already. It is an entire world and I loved the inhabitants. This is in my very short list of top favorites of all time. Thank you Michele!

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my final book for 2019 and what a great one it was! I have an interest in reading about polar exploration and this long novel had the benefit of a young woman leader/narrator, plenty of danger and adventure, and beautiful writing including musings on science and philosophy. While not for everyone, it ticked off a lot of boxes for me.

[Kathy Kattenburg · Rating 4 out of 5]

If it were not for too many convenient coincidences in service of bringing together the collection of fictional friends who became part of the fictional character Morgan Lamont's expedition to the Antarctic and the South Pole, I would have given this book 5 stars. Because, really, although Antarctic Navigation IS a novel -- and all the characters in it imagined (except for historical figures like Robert Falcon Scott) -- it reads like nonfiction, and in important ways is autobiographical. The author, Elizabeth Arthur, really did go to Antarctica (on a grant from the National Science Foundation). So the detailed and lyrical descriptions of Antarctica are very much hers. Hers also, clearly, are the myriad of scientific, philosophical, historical, and spiritual ideas she spends much of the book exploring. To read this book is to get the beginnings of a strong education in physics, biology, ecology, cognitive function, and group dynamics, as well as a thorough grounding in the history of Antarctic exploration. Without that, the plot is pretty thin, but that's okay because learning and thinking about the mind, imagination, thought, matter, energy, and their relationship with the natural world and the universe is pretty much what the book is about, and certainly the reason it's almost 800 pages long.

[Andrei Brinzai · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not really my kind of book at first, however the second attempt at reading it ended in success. Though I felt like the pace was too slow for the first 300 pages until we find out who Morgan Lamont is and what connects her to the people who would later join her on this Antarctic adventure, I really cannot fault the long, vivid descriptions and the writing style.

I had a couple of moments when I felt I just have to close the book and admit defeat, somehow the book has a pull, just like Antarctica, and I managed to soldier on, past McMordor, and arrive at the South Pole. At times, when the author veered towards subjects like physics, philosophy, psychology, Greek history, I felt like I was reading a couple of books at once, however I found the commentary quite engaging.

This book was as vast as the Ice, but somehow no less captivating and it rekindled my interest in reading more about the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.

[Catherine Symchych · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took a really long time to get to the Antarctic, and this wasn’t at all a quick read, but I liked it. Some beautiful language and writing as we got to know Morgan and bits of those who surrounded her. Despite (in error) talking about emperor penguins and their brown chicks the author has clearly done her research. I didn’t like how the very end got a little preachy, but love these passages:
The space behind your eyelids is the largest space in the world; there is so much space there that you can never be stuck in it, and surely you can never fill it up. (p. 726)
Because just as I am taking the Ice, and the Terra Nova hut, north with me, so I am also leaving a piece of myself behind. And once I leave, then wherever I journey, I will be able to send my thoughts southward, to rejoin the part of me that still remains here. (p. 788)

Clearly we need to read, have new experiences, and travel.

[David Dennington · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book takes us on an imaginative journey of a woman’s life through highly picturesque places and situations, highlighting countryside, environment and politics. Elizabeth Arthur opened my eyes to how it would actually feel to be in the Antarctic—quite a feat, since it’s a wilderness of ice and light.

[B_rodger · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is everything the blurbs on the back say it is - bold in concept, meticulously researched, great craftsmanship, deeply felt — but omg it’s about 300 pages too long. The unbearable longness of book. The Antarctica stuff is fabulous, but there’s so much navel-gazing. I think you really could cut about 300 pages out of this 790-page monster and had a novel to remember.

[Liz · Rating 3 out of 5]

DNF@250 pages
I really wanted to like this more than I did. But 250 pages in and I was just so bored. With almost 550 more pages to go I just couldn't continue. The writing was good but the story was too slow.

[Klissia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Raramente abandono um livro porém esse estava me dando dor de cabeça literalmente. Uma mulher comandando uma expedição a Antártica seria uma estória excitante,mas torna- se prolixa com detalhes sobre pessoas,causos, cronologia, que distraem da estória principal que nunca chega...

[Shamana Ali · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superlative writing, authentic and poetic at times. Storytelling in the best of the tradition. Highly rec.

[Dixie · Rating 4 out of 5]

4-1/2 stars. A magnificent book.

[Zora · Rating 5 out of 5]

Actually, this should be 6/5 stars! :-)

[M]

Dnf

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a hard one to write a review on; it was an epic novel of a young girl starting life within a dysfunctional family who becomes obsessed with the Scott journey in 1912 to the South Pole. The author starts the reader there, with the obsession and with her family in Colorado.

As she grows, her passion for all things related to the Ice are woven into the family she finds, the friends she forms relationships with and the jobs she pursues. She knows she will travel to and see the Terra Nova hut in Antartica and this 790-page book takes every page to tell us of her journey.

I wanted to like this book better - I generally love history, a strong woman lead character, polar exploration and all the sciences from physical to human. I also liked some of the perspectives and views of the author on everything from the environment to governments and relationships near and far (between Scott's team and his wife back in England as an example).

However, I've always found brevity and the use of language in a spare form as a superhuman quality for an author. This book uses every page to go into details that are not additive to the story. Yes, they give information and viewpoints on issues (Desert Storm) but it made me want to give up on this book numerous times even though I liked the characters and where the book was bringing me. So while the subject and even some of the writing is a "5" for me, I have to give it a "4".

[Michelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finishing a book of this length makes me feel like I accomplished something! But besides that, I'm so glad I read it - a really interesting account of one woman's quest to recreate Scott's journey to the South Pole and back again (over 1600 miles on foot - skiing or using crampons the entire way). At times, the social commentary on environmentalism became a bit tedious. But overall, a great read. Several years ago I read "Endurance" (by Lansing - one of my all time favorites, hands down!) and have always held a fascination for the Antarctic - great to read a book which shed so much more light on that magical land.

[Sandy Sopko · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book SOOOO long ago, and I will never forget it! Other titles about Antarctica have recently come to my attention and brought this novel back to mind. It was engrossing and compelling and made me -- a firm sunshine and warm weather girl -- long for the ice and vast emptiness of Antarctica! I completely lost myself in it, which, though I read quite a bit, doesn't happen often. I highly recommend it! It was long, but well worth every second.

[Kathy Smith · Rating 2 out of 5]

Even though the main character was very interested in protecting the environment, which is, of course, a large issue, she seemed exceptionally self absorbed when it came to her personal life. The story was all right, but I felt the author could have told the story and made her point in far fewer pages. I don't think that I would have stayed with it if it hadn't been something I was reading for a book group.

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book. Read it years ago and plan to revisit it very soon. I found it extremely engrossing, mesmerizing, and cerebral. Three characteristics I look for in a book. This is not a light little summer beach read however but well worth the energy spent within it's 800 pages

[Larry · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a bit intimidated by this weighty tome (almost 800 pages) but once I got started I enjoyed it a lot.
Likes: Lots of stuff about Antarctica. Well researched.
Dislikes: Too much greeny liberalism. Dumb love triangle.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much of the writing is beautiful. The research that had to go into the book is astounding. The story is compelling in part, but I was disappointed with some of the characters' development (or lack of). All in all an amazing book.

[Kelsey Burnette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! I thought I would never finish this beast of a book, but I'm glad I stuck with it. Certainly the only way I will ever be able to visit Antarctica! Pretty amazing journey, if a little ramble-y here and there.

[Shesher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great story, great history of the Antartic. Favorite book of 2000.