I May Be Some Time: Ice and the English Imagination - Softcover

Spufford, Francis

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0312220812 ISBN 13: 9780312220815

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin, 1999

Synopsis

Francis Spufford explores the British obsession with polar exploration in a book that Jan Morris, writing in The Times, called, "A truly majestic work of scholarship, thought and literary imagination . . ."

The title, a last quote from one explorer to his party as he left their tent never to return, embodies the danger and mystery that fueled the romantic allure of the poles and, subsequently, the British imagination. Far from being a conventional history of polar exploration, I May Be Some Time attempts to understand what was going on in the minds of the polar explorers as they headed toward destinies like Terra Nova.

Serving up a heady brew of Captain Perry, Jane Eyre, gastronomic obsessions with iced desserts, and the daily lives of Eskimos, Spufford treats the reader to one of the most satisfying and imaginative contemporary works dealing with exploration and human need.

About this title

From the Publisher:

"Shot through with crystalline brilliance...If you have any interest in the ethos of extreme travel you won't want to be left behind." --The Washington Post Book World

"Francis Spufford's account of the early expedition to the Arctic and the Antarctic...is thoughtful, suggestive and oddly fascinating." --Men's Journal

"An engaging, elegant, often majestic work of cultural history." --The Philadelphia Inquirer

"I May Be Some Time is a high-cultural history, both passionate and intricate...breathtaking" --The Boston Globe

"I May Be Some Time is a truly majestic work of scholarship, thought and literary imagination." --Jan Morris

About the Author:

Francis Spufford, writes for the Guardian,has edited two anthologies and lives in Cambridge, England with his wife and daughter. For this, his first book, he received a Somerset Maughm Award and was namedThe Sunday Times (London) Young Writer of the Year.

About this edition

• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0312220812
• ISBN 13: 9780312220815
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 388