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Although some of us here at the Arctic Book Review take a dim view of the place we like to call "the other pole," there's no denying that this region of the earth, nearly as much as the North, has had a deep and abiding attraction to writers of fiction. The granddaddy of them all, of course, is Edgar Allan Poe's Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, which combines elements of exploration narrative, memoir, and fantasy so effectively that Poe's British publisher initially believed it to be a factual account. Pym ends on a strange, ambiguous note, in a region where the water runs white and a mysterious pale figure appears but does not speak. The apparent lack of resolution is "explained" in an editorial note by Poe, who says that "Pym" unhappily died before being able to complete his narrative, which of course has not prevented others from taking up where Poe left off. H.P. Lovecraft, in his At the Mountains of Madness (1936) imagines an archaeolog

Polar Imperative: A History of Arctic Sovereignty in North America By Shelagh D. Grant Toronto: Douglas & McIntyre $39.95 Reviewed by Russell A. Potter Canada's sovereignty over its Arctic territory has been a hot-button issue of late, the more so under the government of Steven Harper. The sight of live-fire interdiction drills, flag-plantings on Hans Island, and the flying of a government minister for a live video at the site of the rediscovery of HMS Investigator in Mercy Bay are all signs of how central the issue has become. And yet, while willing to put out a good deal of money and resources for such shows of force, the federal government of Canada has shown much less interest in supporting the social and infrastructure needs of its Arctic inhabitants, particularly the Inuit. How did this state of affairs come about? With her new book, Polar Imperative , Shelagh D. Grant provides an eloquent and well-documented answer. And, as it turns out, the Harper government is fa

The end of the year often brings a series of oversize packages to the offices of the Arctic Book Review - 'tis the season for large-format, illustrated, and definitive tomes, and this year is no exception. And so, although we've not had time to thoroughly read and review all these titles yet, we'd like to draw our readers' attention to some of the most remarkable among these new offerings. Not all of these books are for everyone -- W.F. Weeks's On Sea Ice is an exhaustive and technical tome, a reference for oceanographers and other scientists whose work involves sea ice (as opposed to land-bound ice and glaciers). Nevertheless, it merits mention for Dr. Weeks's eminently readable and delightful introductory chapter, " Historical Background ," which offers a lively survey of the literature of Ice from ancient times, through to legends such as Scorseby and Nansen, through to the present moment. Our other three volumes are based around photography; eve

Russell Potter: I've read that your initial interest in the Franklin story came from the NOVA broadcast, in which I was a presenter. So, as you can imagine, I'm curious as to which scenes or sequences from this program lingered most in your mind? Dominique Fortier: At first, I was just blown away to see the Terror and the Erebus prisoners of a sea of white and to learn that more than a hundred men had stayed there and managed to survive for almost three years. I remember pausing the TV and calling to my fiancé, asking him if he’d ever heard about that expedition. (He hadn’t either; I gather we are not the only ones in Québec not to have known of it). But there is one image in particular that stuck with me the whole time I was writing the book: that of the men, hungry, thinned and exhausted by the three winters spent in the ice, leaving the ships and starting to walk – towards what they must have known was their death. Nevertheless, they were hauling behind them, in boats

To the long annals of flights of fancy inspired in whole or part by the last, fatal expedition of Sir John Franklin -- a list whose authors include Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, Joseph Conrad, Rudy Wiebe, Mordecai Richler, and Sten Nadolny -- must now be added another name, that of Dominique Fortier. It might be questioned whether, given the continued recourse to the pen over a century and a half by these and numerous other writers, another tale is called for, or even possible -- but after reading On The Proper Use of Stars , I can only say this: no matter how crowded the firmament, there shines here a new and startlingly brilliant light, yet one which takes its place in a familar constellation as though it had always been there. Ms. Fortier's novel -- originally published as De Bon Usage des Etoiles in 2008 -- succeeds by refracting the light of its sources into a series of stellar vignettes, each of which captures a glimpse of one of the many figures who were caught up in the la

We don't usually notice a new book before we've even had a chance to read it -- but Dominique Fortier's On the Proper Use of Stars , which is to to be released this week by McClelland & Stewart, is a very unusual book. For while it will be (by my count) at least the twentieth novel inspired by the career of Sir John Franklin, it is the very first originally written in French by a Canadian Francophone writer. Originally published in Québec as De Bon Usage des Etoiles in 2008, it's been translated into English by Sheila Fischman. The publisher's website describes it thusly: "A sparkling, inventive debut novel inspired by Sir John Franklin's grand — but ultimately failed — quest to discover the Northwest Passage and by his extraordinary wife, Lady Jane." So of course we're keenly looking forward to receiving our copy -- the more so as it turns out that, according to this article in TheSuburban.com , she was first inspired to write it after l

James Fitzjames: The Mystery Man of the Franklin Expedition by William Battersby Stroud, Gloucestershire: The History Press, £20 ISBN 978-0752455129 Reviewed by Russell A. Potter With the publication of this book, we now have full biographies of all of the chief officers of Sir John Franklin's final Arctic expedition of 1845. Franklin himself, of course, is a man of evidently endless fascination; Francis Crozier, his second-in-command, makes up in fortitude what he apparently lacked in charm, and has been seen by some as the " Last Man Standing ." And yet it's Fitzjames, the third in line, who has had, in death as he had in life, the most charmed of reputations, despite the fact that so little was known about him. His lively letters sent home via the last port-of-call in Greenland, his gallant good looks (available in two different daguerreotype images), and his boundless enthusiasm ("I hope that we are forced to stay at least one winter in the ice," as m