The Ice Balloon: S. A. Andrée and the Heroic Age of Arctic Exploration

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The Ice Balloon: S. A. Andrée and the Heroic Age of Arctic Exploration

3.44 of 5 stars 3.44 · rating details · 214 ratings · 58 reviews

In this grand and astonishing tale, Alec Wilkinson brings us the story of S. A. Andrée, the visionary Swedish aeronaut who, in 1897, during the great age of Arctic endeavor, left to discover the North Pole by flying to it in a hydrogen balloon. Called by a British military officer “the most original and remarkable attempt ever made in Arctic exploration,” Andrée’s expediti...more In this grand and astonishing tale, Alec Wilkinson brings us the story of S. A. Andrée, the visionary Swedish aeronaut who, in 1897, during the great age of Arctic endeavor, left to discover the North Pole by flying to it in a hydrogen balloon. Called by a British military officer “the most original and remarkable attempt ever made in Arctic exploration,” Andrée’s expedition was followed by nearly the entire world, and it made him an international legend.

The Ice Balloon begins in the late nineteenth century, when nations, compelled by vanity, commerce, and science, competed with one another for the greatest discoveries, and newspapers covered every journey. Wilkinson describes how in Andrée several contemporary themes intersected. He was the first modern explorer—the first to depart for the Arctic unencumbered by notions of the Romantic age, and the first to be equipped with the newest technologies. No explorer had ever left with more uncertainty regarding his fate, since none had ever flown over the horizon and into the forbidding region of ice.

In addition to portraying the period, The Ice Balloon gives us a brief history of the exploration of the northern polar regions, both myth and fact, including detailed versions of the two record-setting expeditions just prior to Andrée’s—one led by U.S. Army lieutenant Adolphus Greely from Ellesmere Island; the other by Fridtjof Nansen, the Norwegian explorer who initially sought to reach the pole by embedding his ship in the pack ice and drifting toward it with the current.

Woven throughout is Andrée’s own history, and how he came by his brave and singular idea. We also get to know Andrée’s family, the woman who loves him, and the two men who accompany him—Nils Strindberg, a cousin of the famous playwright, with a tender love affair of his own, and Knut Fraenkel, a willing and hearty young man.

Andrée’s flight and the journey, based on the expedition’s diaries and photographs, dramatically recovered thirty-three years after the balloon came down, along with Wilkinson’s research, provide a book filled with suspense and adventure, a haunting story of high ambition and courage, made tangible with the detail, beauty, and devastating conditions of traveling and dwelling in “the realm of Death,” as one Arctic explorer put it.(less)

Hardcover, 256 pages

Published January 24th 2012 by Knopf

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The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard

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Nov 02, 2012 Jan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

I love pretty much any historical book that covers the time period from the 1890s through the 1920s. I also love books about polar exploration. So, as you can imagine, this book was like the perfect storm for me. It was also short, well-written, obviously well-researched, and engaging.

An added bonus of this book is that the author includes a couple of harrowing tales of other polar expeditions gone wrong. I don't think I'd ever heard of a single one of these explorers before. So this book was ch...more

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Mar 14, 2012 Monica! rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2012, iceberg-right-ahead, no-dragons-so-it-must-be-true, a-damn-dim-candle, oprah-might-like-you, this-must-be-what-pain-feels-like, yippie-kay-ai-motherf-cker, now-youve-read-the-book, tastes-like-children-i-mean-chicken

I know some of you are sitting at home right now and thinking to yourselves, "I am bored. I will go on an adventure. I will go to the North Pole! I WILL GO THERE IN A BALLOON!!"

No, friends. No. I am here to tell you this is a terrible idea.

Do you want to know what will happen if you attempt to get to the North Pole in a hot air balloon?

Spoiler!

You will die.

You will die horribly.

You will die, and no one will find your body for fifty years, and they’ll be like, "Hmm, this person doesn’t appear t...more

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Feb 28, 2012 Caren rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult-nonfiction

This book recounts the ill-fated journey of the Swedish explorer, S. A. Andree, in his attempt to reach the North Pole by balloon in 1897. The author also details other ventures to reach the Pole, although by ship and/or sledge, as well as early speculations on just what someone might actually find at the Pole. (Early thinking included a hole into the center of a hollow earth, or , inexplicably, a temperate sea.) This might be a good book to read in the dogs days of August since you will begin t...more

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Oct 29, 2012 Delphine rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: strong-narratives, history

Zeer evenwichtige geschiedenisroman over de tocht van de Zweed Andree en zijn kompanen Strindberg en Fraenkel. De drie hadden het plan opgevat om met een waterstofballon de Noordpool te bereiken, iets waar niemand zich tot dan toe aan had gewaagd. Ze vertrokken in 1897; hun uitgemergelde lichamen werden pas in 1930 teruggevonden. Hun logboeken waren intact gebleven.

Wilkinson belicht in deze roman vooral de geschiedenis van de Noordpool-reizigers in het algemeen. Niet alleen de tocht van Andree...more

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May 27, 2012 David James rated it 5 of 5 stars

Quick, vivid, and marvelously well-written. This account of one of the more peculiar Arctic expeditions follows the fatal and failed 1897 attempt by S. A. Andrée and two companions at being the first to reach the North Pole, doing so via hot air balloon. Wilkinson offers a speedy tale that places Andrée in the context of his times, explores his motivations (he was driven more by the desire to prove his engineering ideas than the glory of being the first to reach the planet's apex), and leaves re...more

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Feb 11, 2013 Unwisely rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, arctic, historical, non-fiction, biography

It has been a while since I've read much Arctic stuff, so this was sort of a welcome visit back to that. Despite the name, the book briefly covers a lot of arctic expeditions - Greely gets a brief review, as does Hudson, and several others. Some of it is just weird (although might not be to someone who hasn't read as much on the topic): there's a (in my opinion) gratuitous swipe at Lady Franklin, John Rae got a dismissive mention.

Any book based on diaries and written accounts has to do some gues...more

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May 05, 2012 William Reichard rated it 3 of 5 stars

The book is fascinating in that it delves deeply into what draws any of us to move toward the unknown, what makes us want or need to explore uncharted territory. Sometimes it's simple vanity, sometimes it's curiosity and intellect, and sometimes it's the need to prove something to oneself. The book uses S. A. Andree's tragic attempt to reach the North Pole in a balloon as a frame, and within that frame packs a number of other narratives related to arctic exploration. What I wanted, in the end, w...more

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Jun 24, 2012 Richard rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is just an amazing story well told by Alec Wilkinson. The book is much more than just the story of Andree and his Polar expedition. In fact, the direct story of Andree's exploration alone wouldn't have been able to fill the book. But the subtitle tells us what the rest of the book is about: The Heroic Age of Arctic Exploration. We learn about the mindset of the era vis a vis Arctic exploration and about some of the other related expeditions.

I've read a couple of other books about these jour...more

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Apr 25, 2013 Holly rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: audio, 2013-reads

Belated review: So I had switched to the print version after the audiobook made me somnolent (sleepy!). Unfortunately, the print version also failed to hold my attention. I'm not sure why. It could be because I am weirdly partial to Antarctic expedition stories more than Arctic stories (but one of the reasons for reading this was to remedy that). Perhaps I could attribute the problem to Wilkinson's way of structuring the book: it was jumpy, disjointed - the ice balloon story wasn't told in a lin...more

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Sep 24, 2012 Christiane rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: biography, disaster, non-fiction, kindle

I love reading books like this on vacation. A cancelled connection and a few hours spent in an airport just doesn't seem so bad when you're reading about a trek across the ice in almost complete darkness, dealing with toes falling off due to frostbite, and having to eat the sled-dogs (or worse!) in order to avoid starvation. S.A Andree had the brilliant idea to float a hot air balloon to the (as yet undiscovered) North Pole, thus, in theory, avoiding all that sledging around on ice floes. His jo...more

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Jun 12, 2012 Anna rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: audio, cold-books

Ice and death made a little dull. Who knew that was possible? It's not the author's fault but the narrator's fault. (I had to listen to it twice to actually get the story.) The story of Swede S.A. Andree and his two colleagues heading off to see the North Pole in 1897 in a hot air balloon is pretty interesting. It didn't work, of course. They only got half way there (300 miles) before they landed the balloon which had been bumping along without a lot of steering for quite a while already and the...more

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Apr 28, 2013 Christina Dudley rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction, adventure-survival

What better to do when you're stuck indoors at a child's swim meet? Let a book take you far, far away to the hushed, perilous, merciless Arctic. Balloonist S. A. Andree's story was new to me, and many (crucial) details of his quixotic expedition to float over the North Pole in a hot air balloon can never be known, which was a little frustrating, but not frustrating enough to spoil my overall enjoyment.

Wilkinson contextualizes Andree's story among late 19th century polarquests, thrilling adventur...more

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Feb 11, 2013 Nathalie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: crazy-ice-explorer-shizz

Don't you love it when books just fall into your life? David found this one in his box at work labeled "review copy", but of course, as much as he'd like to, he won't read it. But being the wonderful husband he is who knows his wife's penchant for serial killers and failed adventure stories, he brought it home to me. Lucky!

A hot air balloon trip to the freaking North Pole? What kind of maniac thinks this SHIZZ up? A 19th century ego maniac polar explorer, that's who!

Not the best writer, this gu...more

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Mar 22, 2013 DR rated it 3 of 5 stars

In July 1897, S. A. Andrée became “the first person to disappear into the air,” according to the author. That he vanished somewhere over the Arctic ice fields with a tuxedo packed for his anticipated post-flight interviews--well, those elements make this story irresistible to me. I happily admit to a weakness for narratives of polar exploration and examples of that peculiarly 19th-century stoicism, blind faith and refusal to adapt that characterized (and often doomed) these misguided adventurers...more In July 1897, S. A. Andrée became “the first person to disappear into the air,” according to the author. That he vanished somewhere over the Arctic ice fields with a tuxedo packed for his anticipated post-flight interviews--well, those elements make this story irresistible to me. I happily admit to a weakness for narratives of polar exploration and examples of that peculiarly 19th-century stoicism, blind faith and refusal to adapt that characterized (and often doomed) these misguided adventurers/scientists.

THE ICE BALLOON tells the story of Andrée, the visionary (or foolhardy) Swedish “aeronaut” who attempted to find the North Pole by flying to it in a hydrogen-filled balloon. The momentous adventure of Andrée and his two companions is combined with a concise history (both myth and fact) of ventures to the northern polar regions. According to a reckoning made in 1930, of the thousand or so people who tested the Arctic or went for the pole, three out of four of them died in the attempt. Many of them drowned or starved and/or froze in the midst of a robust Inuit culture that these “civilized” pioneers were too proud and self-righteous to emulate.

This was considered the great (or, at least, very busy) age of Arctic expeditions, so THE ICE BALLOON includes detailed accounts of an enterprise led to disaster by U.S. Army lieutenant Adolphus Greely and another by Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen, who intentionally embedded his ship "Fram" in the pack ice with the notion of drifting to the North Pole. These 19th-century efforts to traverse the “immense and remorseless ground of the Arctic” (p41) exemplified a kind of daring that often stepped over the line into stupidity; heroism that’s hard to distinguish now from obsessive lunacy; displays of planning skills better suited to a floating scientific conference that a dangerous voyage of exploration. The behavior of men like Andrée, Greeley, Nansen, George de Long of the “Jeannette,” Charles Hall of the “Polaris” (and Sir John Franklin before them) is inexplicable from a 2013 perspective. Author Alec Wilkinson does his best to explain, in the context of their times, their Romantic worldviews and their preoccupations, these endlessly persevering, would-be trailblazers who sailed and sledge-hauled and (in Andrée’s case) wafted into the implacable darkness, wind and cold with equipment and know-how far too primitive for their ambitions. So many of these Arctic treks ended, as the “Polaris” expedition did for survivor George Tyson, with one final, desperate resolve: “This party must not disgrace humanity by cannibalism” (174). To come back alive--with or without the ever-changing "farthest-north" distinction, with or without preserved scientific data--and doing so without partaking of human flesh, was the making of heroic 19th-century celebrity status and income for life.

In Chapter 24, we get a surprisingly interesting Arctic mariner’s glossary of the many, many types of ice. Apparently, there was very little else to do than minutely analyzing the variations in ice when one’s ship is trapped in the stuff for months on end, the wooden vessel all of the while making sounds like a staircase being crushed by a mammoth polar python.

In Chapter 25, Wilkinson elucidates the startling fact that the globe has “more than one North Pole.” Depending on an expedition’s intent and mode of attack, they could be setting out for the geographic pole (like Andrée); the north-magnetic pole (high up in northern Canada); the north geomagnetic pole (on the northwest coast of Greenland); the “pole of relative inaccessibility” or “pole of ice” (flown over in 1926 and not reached on foot until 1968); or, the north pole of cold (in deep Siberia, where temperatures bottom out at -90°F).

Wilkinson’s reconstruction of Andrée’s personality makes him seem like someone we today would consider to have Asperger’s syndrome rather than the arrogant, tone-deaf, emotionally stunted oaf described by his contemporaries. At the very least, Andrée was an awful know-it-all--“He appeared to feel that nothing that interested him was beyond his ability to have an opinion about it”(p46). Unwarranted belief in one’s own preparedness is the predominant hubris of leaders of the early polar expeditions, which they often combined with a tendency to be a martinet (like Greeley and, almost 29 years later, the great idiot Robert Falcon Scott).

As an aeronaut, almost all of Andrée’s assumptions were wrong, so that “Like all the balloonists before him, he had to go where the wind took him” (p149). Or, in this instance, where it didn’t take him. Without his balloon: “Once he landed he was a man with a desk job [in the Swedish Patent Office] trying to cross a landscape as punishing and inhospitable as any in the world” (p229). The two much younger men in the balloon basket with Andrée were a dreamy cousin of August Strindberg’s and a redoubtable “packhorse” who replaced an original team member who wisely got cold feet before they launched. THE ICE BALLOON conveys the most sympathy for Nils Strindberg, who wrote his fiancée fond and lovely letters in shorthand and likely was the first to die three months into their desperate, herculean effort to sledge-haul to safety.

The author’s writing, overall, is only workmanlike and a bit herky-jerky. But, THE ICE BALLOON benefits from frequent excerpts of diaries, journals and letters by a range of expressive polar explorers. The fascinating narrative of Andrée’s fatal adventure is allowed to sail along without the obstacles of countless footnotes (although captions on the too-small and smudgy illustrations would have saved a lot of flipping to the back of the book).
(less)

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Apr 25, 2012 Dan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Chronicles of arctic exploration have always interested me and when I saw this title featured in a Barnes and Noble newsletter a couple of months ago I immediately knew I'd read it. I won't pretend I wasn't swayed by the gorgeous cover art.

Having never heard of S.A Andrée I didn't know what to expect. He and his fellow adventures where the first to attempt a polar approach by balloon: a feat met with more than a bit of skepticism in the late 19th century. That skepticism, it turns out, was well...more Chronicles of arctic exploration have always interested me and when I saw this title featured in a Barnes and Noble newsletter a couple of months ago I immediately knew I'd read it. I won't pretend I wasn't swayed by the gorgeous cover art.

Having never heard of S.A Andrée I didn't know what to expect. He and his fellow adventures where the first to attempt a polar approach by balloon: a feat met with more than a bit of skepticism in the late 19th century. That skepticism, it turns out, was well founded. I'm not giving anything away when I say that theirs was a tragic journey.

Throughout, Wilkinson - a longtime New Yorker contributed - did much to situate the journey historically within the context of polar exploration (both northern and southern). Other attempts by traditional means were presented alongside Andrée's novel approach and did much to inform the narrative in the technology and science employed as well as the levels of physical depravation that explorers endured. For instance, it was a widely help opinion that a temperate sea surrounded the pole. We now know this to be false.

While it was an enjoyable and edifying read, I found it ultimately to be unsatisfying. Andrée's expedition was the focus, but I felt we never got a full picture of his journey. Part of the problem was the super short chapters. That format prevented Wilkinson from really delving into the heart of the matter in the way that a book like Sebastian Junger's The Perfect Storm does so well. The later chapters give a pretty good play-by-play of Andrée's sally, but it felt a bit too removed for my taste. Maybe it's my schadenfreude at it's worse, but I wanted to feel myself trapped on the northern ice floes, hubris exacting it's toll. Overall, I would definitely recommend this book for someone who's interested in the, admittedly narrow, intersection of Victorian polar adventuring and ballooning if for no other reason than the photographs. The cover is just one of many haunting images presented here.(less)

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Apr 06, 2012 Steven rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: history, cold_places, geography, maps, exploration, oceans

I love books about Arctic and Antarctic exploration, and this is one of the better ones I've read lately. It covers a relatively unknown, but quite unusual, attempt to reach the north pole by balloon in 1897. S. A. Andrée's attempt seems foolhardy in hindsight, but one can't help but admire his bravery and drive to try something that had never been tried before.

In addition to describing Andrée's interest in ballooning and Arctic exploration, he goes into detail about some other attempts at the...more

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Apr 07, 2013 Gary Daly rated it 3 of 5 stars

Interesting and straightforward account of a dude who wanted to take a balloon to the North Pole. The results are the regular trapped on the ice scenario where starving, going mental and struggling to stay alive for extended periods of time in extreme (what we now call sport) surroundings. The book is filtered by with historical accounts of other polar disasters where cabalism, mutiny, cowardliness, heroics, luck and misfortune and most of it pretty stiff upper lip stuff. Good bloody cold read.

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Mar 13, 2012 Jrobertus rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a fast paced non-ficition account of an attempt by a team of Swedes, led by S. A. Andrée, to reach the North Pole by hydrogen balloon in 1897. To set the stage it also relates the stories of other explorations, by ship, and sledge, that occured previously. These are invariably tales of incredible suffering and either courage or stupidity, depending on your point of view. THis book has a nice brisk writing pace and the stories are interesting, if a bit over long.

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Feb 10, 2013 Lisa B rated it 3 of 5 stars

I found the other stories about expeditions of failed attempts to reach the arctic fascinating and enthralling but kept waiting for Andree's story. When that finally set forth (around three quarters into the book) I was slightly disappointed at what little there was to write about. Of course, none of this the author's fault. We can only know, what there is to know. Overall, it was very well written and interesting, just not exactly what I had expected.

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Apr 18, 2012 Warnie B. rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: arctic, non-fiction, history, exploration, scandinavia, read-in-2012

I'm a little torn on how to rate this. On the one hand, it's a fascinating story, and I am a total sucker for turn-of-the-century polar exploration tales. On the other hand, well...I didn't find this book to be terribly well-written, despite all the prizes Wilkinson seems to have won for various other things. I found the order in which he told the story really awkward, and felt like he spent more time and energy describing other polar expeditions than he did the one the book is actually supposed...more

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Feb 04, 2012 Parker F rated it 4 of 5 stars

A perfect book for reading while waiting for a bus on a particularly cold winter day. You will suddenly find that the few minutes of cold that you are suffering are not so bad when compared to months or years of being stranded in the Arctic. This is not only the story of Andree's failed balloon expedition to the North Pole, as there are several other accounts of Arctic expeditions involving unexpected mishaps. This also sparked a desire in me to ride on a hot air balloon and eat a polar bear cub...more

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Jun 15, 2013 Laura rated it 1 of 5 stars

Poor Andrees expedition, including backstory, maybe took 75 pages. The rest was contemporary explorations. And would have liked some science about why the balloon did not fly. Spent time on how they might have died, and their erroneous (winds, land/open sea) even silly (entrance to the interior, parallel planet) scientific ideas, why not a discussion of the balloon construction and temperatures, etc.

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Jul 29, 2012 Crotched Mountain rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: crotched-mountain-summer-reading

There are many books about the exploration of Antarctica, this is one of the few comprehensive books about the exploration of the Arctic and the men who risked all in attempts to be the first to the North Pole.
Easy to read and very informative, makes one glad for current transportation vehicles and easily accessible communications.
A great one to read in the middle of a hot summer

Donna C:

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Feb 20, 2013 Jasonb rated it 4 of 5 stars

Did you know that there are four types of North Pole?
1) Magnetic North Pole
2) Geographic North Pole
3) Geomagnetic North Pole
4) The Northern Pole of Inaccessibility

I learned that in this book.

Did you know that in 1871 the ship Polaris while trying to locate the North Pole got stuck in the ice floes and was abandoned ship? The surviving party got on an ice floe in October of 1871 and was stranded and varies others till April 30th of 1872. Unbelieveable!!

I learned that in this book.

As for the story...more

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May 07, 2013 Nancy rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: gave-up

Ended up skimming through this mostly. Some interesting arctic explorer stories, but the main one about S.A. Andree didn't get started till halfway through the book. I'm not sure why the people and story weren't that compelling to me. Perhaps the focus could have been narrowed to create a more engaging read.I love exploration accounts (Endurance being my favorite) but this one sort of fell flat.

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Mar 12, 2012 Jim Blessing rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

This was an interesting book about a Swedish explorer who attempted to reach the North Pole by balloon in 1897. The start and end of the book was best, I only skimmed the middle of it. The attempt failed, and the remains of the explorers were found in 1930. The photographs taken by them were eerie and quite vivid.

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Apr 29, 2013 Laurie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013, non-fiction

2 stars for the audiobook.

This true story of the age of arctic discovery and the ill fated adventure to reach the North Pole in a balloon is an interesting concept to write about, but the execution was too detailed and hard to follow in audiobook. I want to know, but I want it abridged, thanks.

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Mar 26, 2012 Ann rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2012-books

The thought of venturing over the Arctic in a hot-air balloon is just about the craziest thing I can imagine, but even more compelling was the author's retelling of many of the equally brash assaults on the Pole in the 19th century. Not a textbook historical account, but interesting nonetheless.

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Mar 16, 2013 Bart Hoag rated it 4 of 5 stars

Yet another story of arctic and Antarctic exploration that didn't work out! The trauma and suffering that the early explorers went thru is almost unbelievable. This is a great story, well written and well documented, lots of great back ground information about contemporary explorations.

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Jan 14, 2013 Eric Mccutcheon rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

Very interesting time period. I enjoyed all of the stories about these explorers. I really liked the quote about exploring being planned and an adventure when things when awry. Overall though the main narrative was almost secondary to the time and the other explorers. By the time it got to the main balloon tale, the story was a little anticlimatic.

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