Grand tours: A New Year's greeting from the ice

Writers' adventures in literature. Arctic explorer Fridtjof Nansen sees in 1895 with Norwegian punch and aurora borealis

In 1895, Fridtjof Nansen (1861-1930), a Norwegian Arctic explorer, set forth to do what previous polar adventurers had desperately tried to avoid: get caught in pack ice and drift across the North Pole. He was a mentor for both Shackleton and Scott, though the latter ignored Nansen's advice, consequently costing him and his four men their lives in the Antarctic. Nansen spent three years adrift in the Arctic before being forced to abandon ship and return home. In spite of this, his pioneering expedition remains one of the most notorious success stories of polar exploration. Nansen's groundbreaking discoveries about the pattern of Arctic currents ensured that, although he was widely ridiculed in his time, he eventually became a hero among modern polar explorers. This extract was taken from Nansen's book 'Farthest North', and features in 'Dead Reckoning, Great Adventure Writing from the Golden Age of Exploration 1800-1900', edited by Helen Whybrow.

"Wednesday, January 2, 1895. Never before have I had such strange feelings at the commencement of the new year. It cannot fail to bring some momentous events, and will possibly become one of the most remarkable years in my life, whether it leads me to success or to destruction. Years come and go unnoticed in this world of ice, and we have no more knowledge here of what these years have brought to humanity than we know of what the future ones have in store. In this silent nature no events ever happen; all is shrouded in darkness; there is nothing in view save the twinkling stars, immeasurably far away in the freezing night, and the flickering sheen of the aurora borealis. I can just discern close by the vague outline of the Fram, dimly standing out in the desolate gloom, with her rigging showing dark against the host of stars. Like an infinitesimal speck, the vessel seems lost amidst the boundless expanse of this realm of death. Nevertheless, under her deck there is a snug and cherished home for thirteen men undaunted by the majesty of this realm. In there, life is freely pulsating, while far away outside in the night there is nothing save death and silence, only broken now and then, at long intervals, by the violent pressure of the ice as it surges along in gigantic masses. It sounds most ominous in the great stillness, and one cannot help an uncanny feeling as if supernatural powers were at hand, the Jotuns and Rimturser [frost-giants] of the Arctic regions, with whom we may have to engage in deadly combat at any moment; but we are not afraid of them.

"I often think of Shakespeare's Viola, who sat 'like Patience on a monument.' Could we not pass as representatives of this marble Patience, imprisoned here on the ice while the years roll by, awaiting our time? I should like to design such a monument. It should be a lonely man in shaggy wolfskin clothing, all covered with hoar-frost, sitting on a mound of ice, and gazing out into the darkness across these boundless, ponderous masses of ice, awaiting the return of daylight and spring.

"The ice-pressure was not noticeable after 1 o'clock on Friday night until it suddenly recommenced last night. First I heard a rumbling outside, and some snow fell down from the rigging upon the tent roof as I sat reading: I thought it sounded like packing in the ice, and just then the Fram received a violent shock, such as she had not received since last winter. I was rocked backward and forward on the chest on which I was sitting. Finding that the trembling and rumbling continued. I went out. There was a loud roar of ice-packing to the west northwest, which continued uniformly for a couple of hours or so. Is this the New-year's greeting from the ice?

"We spent New-year's-eve cozily, with a cloudberry punch-bowl, pipes, and cigarettes. Needless to say, there was an abundance of cakes and the like, and we spoke of the old and the new year and days to come. Some selections were played on the organ and violin. Thus midnight arrived. Blessing produced from his apparently inexhaustible store a bottle of genuine 'linje akkevit' [line eau-de-vie], and in this Norwegian liquor we drank the old year out and the new year in. Of course there was many a thought that would obtrude itself at the change of the year, being the second which we had seen on board the Fram, and also, in all probability, the last that we should all spend together. Naturally enough, one thanked one's comrades, individually and collectively, for all kindness and good-fellowship. Hardly one of us had thought, perhaps, that the time would pass so well up here. Sverdrup expressed the wish that the journey which Johansen and I were about to make in the coming year might be fortunate and bring success in all respects. And then we drank to the health and well-being in the coming year of those who were to remain behind on board the Fram. It so happened that just now at the turn of the year we stood on the verge of an entirely new world. The wind which whistled up in the rigging overhead was not only wafting us on to unknown regions, but also up into higher latitudes than any human foot had ever trod. We felt that this year, which was just commencing, would bring the culminating-point of the expedition, when it would bear its richest fruits. Would that this year might prove a good year for those on board the Fram; that the Fram might go ahead, fulfilling her task as she has hitherto done; and in that case none of us could doubt that those on board would also prove equal to the task intrusted to them.

"New-year's-day was ushered in with the same wind, the same stars, and the same darkness as before. Even at noon one cannot see the slightest glimmer of twilight in the south. Yesterday I thought I could trace something of the kind; it extended like a faint gleam of light over the sky, but it was yellowish-white, and stretched too high up; hence I am rather inclined to think that it was an aurora borealis. Again to-day the sky looks lighter near the edge, but this can scarcely be anything except the gleam of the aurora borealis, which extends all round the sky, a little above the fog-banks on the horizon, and which is strongest at the edge. Exactly similar lights may be observed at other times in other parts of the horizon. The air was particularly clear yesterday, but the horizon is always somewhat foggy or hazy. During the night we had an uncommonly strong aurora borealis; wavy streamers were darting in rapid twists over the southern sky, their rays reaching to the zenith, and beyond it there was to be seen for a time a band in the form of a gorgeous corona, casting a reflection like moonshine across the ice. The sky had lit up its torch in honor of the new year – a fairy dance of darting streamers in the depth of night. I cannot help often thinking that this contrast might be taken as typical of the Northman's character and destiny. In the midst of this gloomy, silent nature, with all its numbing cold, we have all these shooting, glittering, quivering rays of light.

'Dead Reckoning' is published by WW Norton & Co (£23.95 hardback, ISBN 0393 01054 6) and is available to 'Independent on Sunday' readers for £19.50 including p&p within the UK. To obtain a copy call 01243 779 777 and quote 'Independent on Sunday offer'.

Follow in the footsteps

Polar attraction

Nansen's extract highlights the barren beauty and tranquillity of one of the world's most inaccessible areas. But Nansen's fixation with reaching the Geographic North Pole meant that when his plan to drift there failed, he had to seek alternative means; enduring an almost unbelievable ordeal.

Leaving the ship with just one companion, Hjalmar Johansen, and 100 days of supplies, Nansen set off across the ice; knowing that to live they would have to return home separately as the Fram was drifting south. They battled across an almost impassable surface, but after getting closer to the pole than anyone before them, they were forced to turn back due to a lack of supplies. Travelling southwards, they managed to reach the island of Franz Josef Land in the northern Arctic Ocean.

There they stayed for the bitter winter in a shelter constructed from rocks, ice, and animal hides and living mainly on Polar Bear meat. They left by kayak in the summer, encountering the British explorer Frederick Jackson and his men. On being taken back to Norway in August 1896, they found themselves the centre of worldwide fascination. They arrived at almost exactly the same time as the Fram, which had finally broken free from the ice in which it had drifted for three years.

Getting there

Thankfully, getting to the North Pole is now a lot simpler and more comfortable than in Nansen's day. Quark Expeditions (01494 464080, www.quarkexpeditions.com) offers a 13-night voyage to the pole, departing from Oslo on 6 July 2003 for £9,967 per person, based on two sharing a standard cabin. Flights to and from Oslo are not included in the price.

By Dominic Hewing