Product Description

From Scott's ill-fated expedition to the Antarctic, through successive attempts on Everest from Shipton in the 1930s through to Hillary's successful climb in 1953, and on through the conquest of space to the mapping and charting of the world's last unexplored territories, this work covers all the major explorers and expeditions of the 20th century. Illustrated with rare photos from the archives of "The Times", the book is a testament to the adventurers who sought to push back the bounds of human exploration and to penetrate the world's most harsh and threatening environments. Proceeding decade by decade and within these looking at each area of global exploration in turn, it provides a complete chronological and geographical overview of exploration in the 20th century.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #443160 in Books
• Published on: 2003-04-07
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 208 pages

About the Author
Richard Sale is an experienced explorer who has climbed and trekked all over the world, but is most at home in the Arctic and higher terrains. His previous accounts of Arctic travel appear in Arctic Odyssey, To the Ends of the Earth and On Top of the World.

Customer Reviews

Some interesting sections but overall rather "Average"
There are many books in this price range (or less) purporting to provide a wide ranging description of world "Explorers". This one's supposed "differentiating factor" is the access to the picture library of "The Times". As a result it does cover a number of "lesser known" 19 and 20th century explorers together with less common photographs and this possibly makes it worth its space on the shelf. I personally found the space given to late 20C sailors (Ellen MacArthur etc) rather unnnecessary - they were/are not really "explorers" - merely crossing well known parts of the Earth in strange or difficult circumstances should not lead one to be classed as an "Explorer"! A quick perusal discovered 1 absolutely crass error. One wonders how a book from the stable of "The Times" can pass all its proof reads and still emerge with such an error! Page 150 has a picture of a Giant Anteater accompanied by several sentances waxing lyrical about how it is a strange creature whose species has existed for 50 million years called a Tapir!