Winter Away From Home

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A Winter Away From Home

A Winter Away From Home

Rayner Unwin

Around the end of the sixteenth century, several expeditions tried to establish a north-east passage to the Arctic, but fog, packed ice, and the confusing geography of the coast of Russia proved consistently frustrating. However, no one pursued a north-east passage with such tenacious skill as the Dutch sailing-master William Barents.

This book is a marvelously vivid account of the endurance of Barents and his 16-member crew, the first West Europeans to winter in the high Arctic and survive. They battled scurvy, hunger, the assaults of bears, and the intense winter cold followed by a 1,600-mile escape in open boats. The house that these Dutch sailors had built from driftwood on Novaya Zemlya (halfway between mainland Russia and the North Pole) remained undisturbed for 300 years to confirm the tale. Barents died on the way home, but his voyage was meticulously recorded by one of the survivors.

251 pp., Illus. 1995 0924486856

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