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Rating: 
Summary: Antarctic Trip Gone Bad
Review: I bought this book shortly after I saw a documentary on TV outlining this whole situation. The subject of the book - Robert Falcon Scott's deadly walk to and from the South pole. Along with 4 other men, Scott trudged off in the bitter cold and blinding Antarctic. He made it to the South Pole (900 miles one way) only to realize that he'd been beaten two weeks earlier by fellow thrill-seeker Amundsen. On their return trek, they encountered severe wind, continual snow, and record setting bitter cold. With only 160 miles to go, the group under Scott's command decided to set up camp (and only 11 miles from a camp site with food & fuel). There in the tent the remaining 4 men died... dazed and confused and so frost-bitten they probably were unable to walk. So many details of the trek are well documented... the hot dinners to warm their insides; sleeping with the sleeping bags zipped closed all the way to keep the chilled air out; the stench of inside the sleeping bag from continuous moisture, bad breath and body odor; the moist pants crackling; the utter desire to stay dry; and the slow process of getting the ice out of their boots by placing their bare hands or feet in them to melt it away with the body's warmth. It may always remain a question - why did the other 3 men decide to stay with Scott and die in the tent? Personal opinion - many have said that Scott was a bumbling fool for going when he did... that he should have known the weather patterns. He could have and should have used sled dogs, but was too sympathetic (other men on similar treks used sled dogs for the haul and along the way killed them for their meat... Scott was to sympathetic to do this to the kind animals). How good were the meteorology instruments in 1911? Another issue - how could he have forecasted weeks or months in advance the worst winter cold spell (probably) ever recorded at that particular point in time? I admire Scott's bravery & courage and the men he took with him who stuck with him until their doom. 400+ pages with some great vintage black & white photos. Just knowing it's something men did for the sake of exploration - close to 100 years ago - is just amazing. A long but very good read.
Rating: 
Summary: Dr. Tony's Thoughts
Review: I found the book extremely well researched. As a medical doctor I particularly found the scientific focus intruiging. It reads like a Sherlock Holmes mystery, with excerpts from the explorers themselves and Dr. Solomon's analysis of Scott and the crew trials, tribulations and ultimate fate.
From growing up in Northern Minnesota on the icy shores of Lake Superior the book resonated shivers down my spine.
To quote Scott's words "This surely is a god-awful place."
Rating:
Summary: Still not exonerated
Review: Susan Solomon has tried very hard in this well-written and documented new book to exonerate Captain Robert Falcon Scott, the leader of the ill-fated Terra Nova expedition to the South Pole in 1911-1912. In recent years Scott has been accused of everything from simple incompetence to real stupidity by critics of his leadership and organization, which Solomon, an NOAA scientist with a distinguished career and Antarctic experience, clearly finds unjustified. By extensively researching not only the original documentation - diaries of Scott and his men, the expedition's meteorological records, information from other Antarctic expeditions of the day such as Shackleton's 1908-1909 try for the pole and Amundsen's successful polar bid of 1911-1912 - but also modern meteorological data, now available for some years along the entirety of Scott's route to the pole (now the course for aircraft bound for the Amundsen-Scott Station), she has tried her level best to suggest that abnormally cold weather was the deciding factor in the loss of the five-man polar party. And indeed cold weather must have been a factor. The poor weather conditions not only would have debilitated the men and caused severe frostbite, the friction of cold snow would have made it almost impossible for the men to pull their sledges more than a few miles a day. Indeed Solomon has charted the progress of the polar party, comparing it with the two supporting parties that turned back short of the pole, and her information does demonstrate how badly slowed up Scott and his four companions were.The trouble remains, however, that while poor weather clearly contributed to the loss of Captain Scott and his men, Scott's own mistakes and poor planning were also a factor, and to her great credit Solomon does not conceal them, just as Scott, an undeniably courageous and honest man, did not conceal them in his own writings. Scott's assiduous copying of Shackleton's mistakes in 1908-09 (the use of ponies, reliance on unproven motor transport), his own short cuts (spending time testing his motor sledges but not clothing, tents, or other gear), and his failures in leadership (taking five men instead of the planned four to the pole) were instrumental, I believe, in his failure to survive the trek. One also must question why, after the blizzard that trapped the men in their tent 11 miles from a depot of food and fuel, the two well men, Dr. Wilson and the redoubtable Lt. Bowers, did not leave Scott, who was crippled by frostbite, and go to the depot for supplies or even, in the finale extremity, leave Scott to die and save themselves, something Solomon herself seems to find as mysterious as others who have pondered the question, although she advances a possible explanation. Overall this is a very good book, the first to take into account modern knowledge of Antarctic weather and apply it to Scott's tragic expedition. Although I don't feel that the author has entirely proved her thesis, it is a valuable and useful contribution to the controversy over Captain Scott's expedition.
Rating: 
Summary: Last Place on Earth is better!
Review: Susan Solomon's 400+ pages of closely reasearched and well written material can't disguise Capt. Scott's failings in leadership. He may have possessed a modern scientific outlook in his thinking, but his methodology was so often flawed that his expedition was probably doomed from the start. The PBS companion program "Secrets of the Dead" also does a great diservice to Roald Amundsen, characterizing this professional polar explorer's successful journey to the South Pole as "lucky" and "unplanned." Amundsen's achievement--traversing nearly 2000 miles of unknown territory in the harshest climate on the planet with a mixture of meticulous planning and hearty self-reliance--completely eclipses Scott's slavish & unimaginative repetition of Shackleton's route & methods. Roland Huntford's excellent "The Last Place on Earth" remains the classic study of the Amundsen/Scott polar journeys--don't read Solomon without Huntford.
Rating: 
Summary: Whitewashing of a fallen "hero"
Review: This book is nothing less than a bald-faced attempt to whitewash the bumbling ineptitude of one of the 20th Century's most famous losers - Robert Falcon Scott. To blame Scott's failings on weather requires both an ignorance of the facts and a willing suspension of reality. Any REAL "scientific explorer" would not have placed his life (and worse, the lives of his men) in the hands of something as fickle as meteorology. Amundsen certainly didn't, and he was rewarded with success. Amundsen was the TRUE scientist in the saga of finding the South Pole - next to Amundsen, Scott was nothing but a rank and pompous amateur. To lionize a faulty leader such as Scott is almost criminal. Solomon goes to great lengths to extoll the genius-quality predictive abilities of Simpson, Scott's meteorologist, but then lightly passes over the very fact that Simpson's predictions were WRONG. She also never addresses the issue that meteorology TODAY is still half "black art and magic," and that to expect perfect accuracy in 1910 of a new science like meteorology in an unexplored land like Antarctica (as Scott did) smacks of pure idiocy! This book adds nothing of worth to the literature of polar exploration.
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Summary: New Insight Disturbing
Review: This book is very readable and enjoyable, even for those familiar with Scott's story. The reason for the one star deduction is the author's half-hearted defense of Scott. Several of the examples she uses to demonstrate that Scott was not a total idiot actually confirm Scott's deficiencies. Scott's largest flaw was his inability to learn from his previous experience. In his initial foray into Antartica, he took two excursions that found him making it back barely alive. In his trip to the pole, he cut his margin of error too close yet again. The author makes a strong point that Scott had been informed by Simpson of the March temperatures and expected temperature differences further south, yet Scott did not alter his plans to accordingly. What the author may have missed is that the Scott/Amundsen dielectic is one of the dying empire/doing it the British way with human fortitude (ie. stiff upper lip) versus a new country/adjusting to the circumstances as required. Scott was doomed by the paradigm he was working within. Amundsen represented the new paradigm that would eventually replace Scott's paradigm. Scott's failure was a harbinger of the decline of the British Empire. The major contribution of the book is the revelation that Scott in the final days was not held back by the weather. The obvious conclusion, that the author dances around, is that Scott, due to his back frostbite and inability to go on himself, failed to follow in Oates' heroic footsteps and allow Wilson and Bowers the chance to survive. Scott's vanity and lack of courage cost may have cost them their lives. I had a very low opinion of Scott before reading this book. Knowing that Scott lied about the weather and the reason their party was stalled lowers my opinion of him further. Someone interested in polar exploration should begin by reading The Last Place on Earth. When done with that, Solomon's book adds an interesting twist on the story.
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Summary: The Coldest March-High Adventure in Antartica
Review: This is a fascinating tale of high adventure in Antarctica that is well documented with all the scientific facts that a scientist or scholar would demand in a research paper. I chose to read it as a true story of a heroic struggle by a determined group of men who willingly followed Scott out of love and respect, despite terrible hardships. Besides the obvious hardship of the cold, the men also faced death by drowning, starvation, disease and were even threatened by Killer Whales trying to break through the ice to get to the men and the horses. A must read for the real or would be adventurer!
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Summary: Interesting assessment of Scott's Polar journey......
Review: This is a really thoughtful, well-researched assessment of Scott's fatal Polar expedition. It is insightful and gives the reader a clear explanation of many issues that affected the outcome of one of the most interesting expeditions of all times. It is full of information that brings to life what these MEN did almost a hundred years ago. Exploration is on a different level these days. Nothing like it was for Scott's party and those of his era experienced. Brave and daring like nothing we can imagine.I think anyone interested in Polar exploration will be thoroughly satisfied with the subject matter covered in this well written book. It covers survival issues like no other book on the subject I have seen to date.It is a subject that I find fascinating and this book brings out the horrific circumstances that they had to contend with and is a more fair appraisal of Scott's effort to reach the South Pole. Well worth your time and consideration.
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Summary: More Scott apologists bleating
Review: Yet another attempt to 'clear' the name of one of best examples of poor leadership in the history of exploration. This book documents many of Scott's errors but attempts to excuse them through judicious editing, taking quotes out of context, giving the same weight to her opinions, and reference to one-sided hypothetical situations. One thing that is even clearer to me after reading this is that Scott made many of the same errors on his first expedition but did not bother to learn from them or change anything important, surely this is critical in a leader? Another aspect of leadership is assuming things might go wrong and planning for them. Scott assuming EVERYTHING would go right with no margin for error. This included his final major poor decision to take five men, with only 4 sets of skis to the pole.
I think the author wants to believe the marketing about Scott not the evidence, which is disappointing in an acknowledged skilled scientist. She certainly didn't let many of the previously validated facts get in the way of her hypothesis.
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