An Antarctic Affair (Emma McEwin, East Street, $32.95 pb, ISBN 9781921037306, March) ***

Perhaps most widely known as the face of Australia’s early $100 note, Australian Douglas Mawson was a contemporary of the better-known Robert Scott and Scott’s rival in the race to the South Pole, Roald Amundsen. (Amundsen won and Scott’s party famously perished.) Perhaps because he died of natural causes, or because his aims in Antarctica were less tangible to the public, Mawson has not gained his contemporaries’ fame—at least this is the theory of his great-granddaughter Emma McEwin. Outlining his background, his engagement to the impressive sounding Paquita, and his superhuman survival—alone and on foot in the Antarctic wilderness following the death of his two companions—An Antarctic Affair uses biographies, letters, diaries and telegrams to illustrate aspects of the explorer’s character which determined his survival. While Paquita is a presence in the tale, she is far from a central one. Disappointingly, the author’s personal memories and family associations are minimal, and she does not employ the poetic language that made the writing of some of the early explorers so evocative. Nonetheless, this tale, with all its gory details (the men had to eat their loyal huskies and there is speculation about cannibalism) paints a vivid picture. This book has a readership, but it is not the one the romantic cover might suggest.

Matthia Dempsey is editor of Bookseller+Publisher

This review from Australian Bookseller & Publisher magazine is reproduced by kind permission of Thorpe-Bowker, a division of R R Bowker LLC. © Copyright 2008, Thorpe-Bowker

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