John Rae Arctic Explorer

John Rae (ed William Barr)

Polya Press

£46.50

John Rae’s Orkney boyhood, shooting, fishing, climbing and sailing his 18’ Brenda in all sea conditions, was essential training for his extraordinary feats of exploration. Rae characteristically travelled light, often in small open boats, relying on his hunting skills and good relationships with the native people. In this unfinished autobiography he describes ten years as medical officer of the Hudson’s Bay Company; expeditions north in 1846-7, 1848, 1851, 1853-4 but breaks off before his discovery of the fate of the Franklin expedition. Editor William Barr speculates that he may have found it too painful to write. This edition has few concessions to the general reader (particularly disappointing maps) but Rae’s writing is vivid and absorbing, if not for the squeamish.