![]() “Ink blots on the reverse of the page seem to show the haste with which each copy was signed. “The book includes the signature of every member of the shore party who made the trek,” says Suzanne. He died on the island of South Georgia in 1922 as he travelled yet again to the frozen South. In 1914 Shackleton’s ship “The Endurance” was crushed by ice, and he travelled 720 miles across South Atlantic Seas to find help, an adventure which made him even more famous. Though he survived the expedition described in “The Heart of the Antarctic,” Shackleton’s later expeditions were ill-fated. However, the shelf-mark on the old card catalogue for this item was still valid and it was fetched by Special Collections colleagues without any problem.” “In 1980, when we bought our first computer, we had to re-describe over a million volumes, and some of them simply got missed given the scale of the task. Richard Espley, Head of Modern Collections, adds: ![]() ![]() “The book had been carefully described on a card, and the book kept in very safe storage, but had never been described on the electronic catalogue, so that we essentially didn't know that we owned it.” “I was searching the archives as advanced planning for a potential exhibition in the Library, to find titles owned by the University relating to Shackleton,” says Suzanne. Now, one hundred years after Shackleton’s untimely death on the island of South Georgia, a copy of the signed edition has been discovered by a member of Library staff, Suzanne Canally, as she worked through old library cards used to catalogue items before the introduction of computers. To capitalise on this success Shackleton’s publishers asked Shackleton to sign 300 copies of a deluxe edition, which were sold on a “first come, first served” basis to wealthy collectors. With Shackleton’s celebrity already matching that of his rivals, Captain Robert Scott and Roald Amundson, “The Heart of the Antarctic” was a bestseller on publication in 1909. Shackleton’s record of his journey made him famous around the world and transformed him into a symbol of achievement and hope in an age of darkness and war.One hundred years after his death, a rare book signed by Polar adventurer and hero Ernest Shackleton has been unearthed by an intrepid librarian in the unfathomed depths of the University of London’s Senate House Library. It is a tale unlike any to come before or since. It is the story of a voyage that lasts nearly three years-a firsthand account of hurricane-force winds, subzero temperatures, glaciers, icebergs, freezing water, starvation, and lethal, terrifying storms. ![]() Written by Shackleton, South is a truly astonishing story of human fortitude. South is the legendary story of Shackleton and his crew’s struggle to survive the elements and return home alive. ![]() Despite his experience in the Antarctic, disaster strikes early on when the Endurance is trapped in packed ice and slowly crushed, forcing Shackleton and his men off the ship and stranding them in a sea of ice. But Shackleton’s optimism doesn’t last long. He has a ship (the aptly named Endurance), a head brimming with optimism, and 28 men willing to follow him on an expedition across some of the most treacherous terrain on the planet. In 1914, as Europe braces for an unfathomably deadly war, explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton sets sail for Antarctica to do the impossible: traverse the continent. ![]()
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