This Accursed Land

Classic book on Antarctic exploration, available again in an Australian edition after many years out of print Douglas Mawson is Australia's greatest polar explorer This book covers the single most harrowing journey Mawson ever experienced Foreword by Sir Edmund Hillary who described the book as the greatest story of lone survival in polar exploration New photographs and illustrations not available in previous editions About The Author Lennard Bickel, born in 1924, was a leading Australian writer and commentator on scientific affairs, becoming a correspondent for the ABC and the Australian newspaper. This Accursed Land has become his most enduring book and is a bona fide classic Australian biography. This genre sells extremely well, the re-release of Home of the Blizzard in the late 90s sold over 20k copies, and the likes of Jon Krakauer & Joe Simpson (Touching The Void) show the breadth of interest. New Foreword by Tim Jarvis Tim Jarvis recreated the Mawson expedition in 2007. Using the same clothing, equipment & rations. This book will use Tims photographs alongside the originals. It is fascinating to see Mawsons hut as it stands today alongside the original photographs. A Most Amazing Story Antarctica is not generally friendly to life, and is aggressively hostile to human life, and yet for the last 150 years explorers have pitted themselves against it time and again. Frequently, and particularly during the 'heroic' age of the first couple of decades of the twentieth century, their efforts were met with extreme danger and even death. The names Scott, Shackleton and Amundsen are writ especially large in our cultural history because of their harrowing journeys to the ice continent. Douglas Mawson's name does not shine quite as brightly, which ironically gives him much credit: he was not so much a pole-chaser as a committed scientist, and won more secrets from Antarctica than his more famous contemporaries put together; and careful planning meant that he usually suffered less from the mishaps that plagued others. And yet, just once, catastrophe did strike. Three hundred miles from base-camp - three hundred miles of the coldest, most lethal territory on earth - Mawson lost one of his two companions and most of his supplies down a crevasse. Soon after the survivors' attempt to claw back to base began, his other companion died in the horrendous conditions they had to bear. This disaster, and Mawson's incredible 6-week solo journey back to base - described by Sir Edmund Hilary as the greatest story of lone survival in polar exploration - make up the thrilling narrative of Lennard Bickel's book.