Lost In the Antarctic tells the story of how twenty-eight men board a ship, The Endurance, to cross the Atlantic Ocean to reach Antarctica.

The Endurance was a ship that took twenty-eight men to sail across the Atlantic Ocean to Antarctica. The expedition was launched on August 8^th, 1914, during WWI. In this story, we mainly focus on the boss, Ernest Shackleton, who is leading the voyage alongside friends such as Frank Wild, Harry McNish, and Worsley who are just some of the people constantly mentioned in this book. During the book, they face severe weather, starvation, and frostbite. Lost In the Antarctic highlights all the very best and worst moments of their journey, truly testing the limits of both the boss and the whole crew. Sometimes your choices might lead you down a dangerous road, but how you deal with your actions is what matters.

This pressure map represents Ernest Shackleton (the boss) and all his worries and fears. For most of the book, Shackleton must pretend that he is okay, putting his crew’s needs before his own. This becomes clear in the beginning of the book when he constantly gives out extra food telling everyone that it’s going to be ok. As the book progresses, we see him getting more and more anxious.

Here is the pressure map and all the things he has done and is worried about:

Even though this is a non-fiction book focusing on historical events, it focuses on the individual’s emotions and how they must have felt crossing the Atlantic to the freezing continent. Aside from, all the great facts and things you can learn from this book, some great story elements made Lost In the Antarctic come to life. Hidden Issues and Man-to-Man conflicts concerning Ernest Shackleton made this book more enjoyable to read. This book not only teaches you about the crew’s treacherous journey around the coldest place on earth but also about loyalty, strength, and leadership.

Here are the story elements of this book I wrote down:

With all the story elements that keep coming up in this book, I feel that Ambition was a big part of what made Lost In the Antarctic such a daring quest for its cast of characters to endure. From surgically removed toes to disease scurvy, Shackleton and the crew were knocked about like a snow globe being shaken by a small child. Shackleton had already been to the cold continent before and planned to go again, he hung up signs in a wealthy part of London to get people interested. He was ready to do anything and everything he could to get back on the ice. Even though people said it was a waste of time and he shouldn’t bother, his ambition and longing for the sea were enough to drag him back out.  It’s not wrong to want adventure sometimes you just need to find the right people to take on that journey.

Here is my ambition’s central idea and theme paragraph:

In past expeditions, Shackleton knew there was a big risk, as big a risk as when he went in August of 1914. He was prepared for this risk though, he felt as though others’ lives mattered more than his own and he truly proved this again and again. It didn’t matter if he was dying of hunger or thirst, he would hide those emotions and try to help those around him. Shackleton had dragged those people out in the first place that had almost no experience so he always did what he could to help. A good leader knows the limits of those around him.

Shackleton helping Frank Wild Central idea page here:

Lost In the Antarctic tells a very amazing story of and would be a great, compelling read. Thanks for getting to the end of my blog post!