#Julian Sancton

[terrorcamp]

SUNDAY KEYNOTE ANNOUNCED

We’re thrilled to announce that on Sunday 8th, we’ll be joined by JULIAN SANCTON, author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth.

In the Antarctic winter of 1898, Belgian naval officer Adrien de Gerlache, captain of the Belgica, made the glory-seeking (and ill-advised) decision to sail deep into the ice, ultimately stranding his ship and and its multinational crew for months in the polar night.

In Madhouse at the End of the Earth, Julian Sancton chronicles the mayhem that unfolded under those most extreme circumstances. He’ll be joining us for our Sunday keynote to talk all things Belgica, as well as answering questions from the audience!

❄️ Register now!

[snapbookreviews]

Spring 2024 Behind-the-Scenes Reading

Have a gander of what I spent my spring reading. It's a lot of history and archives.

I swear I have had multiple posts eaten by websites in the past month. I had a whole bunch of Tweets scheduled and they disappeared and I had this post queued and it disappeared. I’m already so busy and scattered, websites losing my queued posts is literally the last thing I need. Anyway, a few weeks belatedly, here’s the quarterly Spring post. *shakes fist at the rapidly enshitifying…

[irenydraws]

extremely silly belgica pacific rim AU drawn shortly after reading madhouse at the end of the earth for the first time aaallll the way back in early 2022. you can tell it was early days because i was still trying to get the hang of roald and he's way too hot here

'ireny is roald's and fred's jaeger just a cone' yeah it is

guys who are drift compatible: fred and roald, raco and artocho, danco and lecointe

guys who can't drift: melaerts

[amundsenxcook]

belgica tv show save me. save me belgica tv show

[goddisposez]

finally reading madhouse at the end of the earth and waow no one was exaggerating when they said that cookmundsen is so real...roald full-on giggling and twirling his hair and kicking his feet whenever he saw cook in his sealskin fit. whenever cook did literally anything

[roaldamundsen]

I don't even know the time schedule for terror camp. or the timezone

[gabriestat]

it was beautiful to miss terror camp events now i have unlimited entertainment to watch while i eat

[perenial]

i love voting for what i think is the blatantly obvious choice in these arctic hottie polls just based on looks and then i scroll down an inch farther and see you campaigning your heart out for the ugly one (JOKE JOKE JOKE JOKE)

and what about it

[monstrousdaughter]

begging all my followers who are not yet polarpilled to look up frederick cook. no I can't give you any context it's funnier if you go in blind enjoy ❤️

[areyougonnabe]

ALFRED LANSING ENDURANCE YOU WILL ALWAYS BE FAMOUS

Listening to a non-fiction book about maritime disaster and the way this author is describing the ship sinking is so sexual

[terrorcamp]

Sunday keynote starting now!

Join us now on Zoom as we hear from Julian Sancton, author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth, which chronicles the mayhem that unfolded during the Belgica Antarctic Expedition.

Follow us on Twitter for live updates from the conference! ❄️

[jesslovesboats]

I guess it's time to start moving some content from twt over here! For those who don't know me, I'm a public librarian with a special interest in polar and nautical history, and I love nothing more than connecting readers with good books. I've managed to convert some friends to my way of thinking, and one of them coined the phrase "sad boat books" to describe the types of books that I'm always reading and recommending. Here is my first list of sad boat books-- I can personally vouch for all of them!

New to sad boat? Start here to see if it’s for you!

Endurance by Alfred Lansing

Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton

The Worst Journey in the World- The Graphic Novel Volume 1: Making Our Easting Down adapted by Sarah Airriess from the book by Apsley Cherry-Garrard

Frozen in Time: The Fate of the Franklin Expedition by Owen Beattie and John Geiger

Terra Nova, A GREAT first expedition!

The Worst Journey in the World- The Graphic Novel Volume 1: Making Our Easting Down adapted by Sarah Airriess from the book by Apsley Cherry-Garrard

The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard

A First Rate Tragedy by Diana Preston

Robert Falcon Scott Journals- Captain Scott’s Last Expedition by Robert Falcon Scott

“I Love Ernest Shackleton” starter pack

Endurance by Alfred Lansing

Shackleton’s Boat Journey by Frank Worsley

The Endurance by Caroline Alexander

“I Hate Ernest Shackleton” starter pack

The Lost Men by Kelly Tyler-Lewis

Polar Castaways by Richard McElrea and David Harrowfield

Roald Roald Roald!

The Last Viking: The Life of Roald Amundsen by Stephen Bown

The South Pole by Roald Amundsen

The Last Place on Earth by Roland Huntford*

*DISCLAIMER: this guy hates Captain Scott and gets most of the Scott details wrong, read for Roald only!

The Franklin Expedition

Frozen in Time: The Fate of the Franklin Expedition by Owen Beattie and John Geiger

Erebus by Michael Palin

May We Be Spared to Meet on Earth: Letters of the Lost Franklin Expedition edited by Russell A. Potter, Regina Koellner, Peter Carney, and Mary Williamson

Non-polar sad boats

The Bounty by Caroline Alexander

Batavia’s Graveyard by Mike Dash

The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger

In The Heart of the Sea by Nathaniel Philbrick

Sometimes a sad balloon can be a sad boat

The Expedition by Bea Uusma

The Ice Balloon by Alec Wilkinson

Karluk/Wrangel Island, the expeditions of my heart

Empire of Ice and Stone: The Disastrous and Heroic Voyage of the Karluk by Buddy Levy

The Ice Master by Jennifer Niven

The Karluk’s Last Voyage by Robert A. Bartlett

The Last Voyage of the Karluk: A Survivor’s Memoir of Arctic Disaster by William Laird McKinlay

Ada Blackjack: A True Story of Survival in the Arctic by Jennifer Niven

Miscellaneous sad boat books that are well worth your time

The Ship Beneath the Ice: The Discovery of Shackleton’s Endurance by Mensun Bound

In The Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette by Hampton Sides

Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton

Alone on the Ice: The Greatest Survival Story in the History of Exploration by David Roberts

Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Polar Expedition by Buddy Levy

If you read and enjoy any of these, please let me know!

[fullcolorfright]

Sketch collage inspired by the 1897-1899 Belgian Antarctic Expedition, after reading Madhouse at the End of the Earth (Julian Sancton, 2021) and My Life as an Explorer (Roald Amundsen, 1927)

[the-grollican]

i think they should double down on. stop tip toeing around it, cowards. start including blatant pornography in the middle of your nonfiction polar exploration books.

i have a theory that every single dude writing about polar exploration wants to fuck at least one of those men. stop calling amundsen strapping stop talking about how tough and manly john rae was and stop describing shackleton like you’re in a romance novel. what’s wrong with you.

[ponkothepenguin]

tierlist of all polar books I've read in 2024!

big year for polar exploration. I will elaborate on any of these

Sorry for image quality- titles under the cut!

5 stars, perfection, no notes, etc: In the Kingdom of Ice by Hampton Sides, Endurance by Alfred Lansing, Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard

Very good, would recommend: Worst Journey in the World graphic novel by Sarah Airriess, The Great White South by Herbert Ponting, Cherry by Sarah Wheeler, The Coldest March by Susan Solomon, Labyrinth of Ice by Buddy Levy, The Ship Beneath the Ice by Mensun Bound, Madhouse at the End of the Earth by Julian Sancton, Erebus by Michael Palin

Average: Endurance by Caroline Alexander, Shackleton’s Forgotten Men by Lennard Bickel, At the Mountains of Madness by H.P Lovecraft

Not my favorite: Alone on the Ice by David Roberts

Jail for 1000 years: The Terror by Dan Simmons (ew)

[jeyneofpoole]

hello as a resident franklin expedition person do you have any recommendations for further reading about it/polar history in general?

yes!!!!! for dipping your toes into the franklin expedition specifically i would start with erebus: the story of a ship by michael palin (yes, the guy from monty python. this book contains more anecdotes than hard facts but is a fun introductory read and it’s honestly really funny). probably the most well-known book about the franklin expedition is frozen in time by dr. owen beattie + john geiger, some of the information i believe has been disputed in the years since publication (published in the 80’s) but the descriptions of the exhumations of the beechey bodies are gorgeous and visceral and it’s by far one of the most ethical and humane exhumations/studies on gravesites that i’ve ever read about. THEN you can graduate to real freak territory and read may we be spared to meet on earth, a collection of all of the letters that the members of the expedition sent before and during the first portion of the journey. others to hit that i haven’t read yet are james fitzjames: the mystery man of the franklin expedition (again, some information like that concerning jfj’s birth has since been disproven, but it’s by far the most comprehensive biography of him that exists. battersby reallyyyyyy loved the guy), unraveling the franklin expedition: inuit testimony (this one is on my shelf! deals, obviously, with the widely disregarded testimony of the indigenous people of the region), and the man who ate his own boots.

now for miscellaneous polar books i would start with endurance by alfred lansing, it’s a classic and was written at a time when members of the endurance crew were still alive, so lansing had exclusive access to multiple firsthand accounts. the only nonfiction that’s ever made me cry. my most recent polar read was madhouse at the end of the earth by julian sancton and i can’t recommend it enough. about the dysfunctional belgica expedition, but also a great introduction to roald amundsen’s whole… thing. super fun. i’m also about to start the worst journey in the world by apsley cherry-garrard, which deals with the scott expedition from the point of view of someone who was actually there. it’s mostly a memoir. for a fun one i have a polar fiction rec that is NOT the terror. where the dead wait by ally wilkes was a super fun read and it’s obvious that they watched the terror and went down the same pipeline that i did. evil gay situationship in the arctic circle supplemented by cannibalism and psychosis is always very fun, they have a second book about antarctica i believe, it’s on my shelf but i haven’t gotten to it yet. thanks so much for asking ily 🫶🫶🫶