''Antarctic Conquest: the Story of the Ronne Expedition 1946-1948'' is a 1949

science book A science book is a work of nonfiction, usually written by a scientist, researcher, or professor like Stephen Hawking (''A Brief History of Time''), or sometimes by a non-scientist such as Bill Bryson ('' A Short History of Nearly Everything''). ...

Norwegian-American Norwegian Americans ( nb, Norskamerikanere, nn, Norskamerikanarar) are Americans with ancestral roots in Norway. Norwegian immigrants went to the United States primarily in the latter half of the 19th century and the first few decades of the ...

Antarctic The Antarctic ( or , American English also or ; commonly ) is a polar region around Earth's South Pole, opposite the Arctic region around the North Pole. The Antarctic comprises the continent of Antarctica, the Kerguelen Plateau and other ...

explorer

Finn Ronne Finn Ronne (December 20, 1899 – January 12, 1980) was a Norwegian-born U.S. citizen and Antarctic explorer. Background Finn Ronne was born in Horten, in Vestfold county, Norway. His father, Martin Rønne (1861–1932), was a polar explorer w ...

and

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

writer

L. Sprague de Camp Lyon Sprague de Camp (; November 27, 1907 – November 6, 2000) was an American writer of science fiction, fantasy and non-fiction. In a career spanning 60 years, he wrote over 100 books, including novels and works of non-fiction, including biog ...

, published in hardcover by

G. P. Putnam's Sons G. P. Putnam's Sons is an American book publisher based in New York City, New York. Since 1996, it has been an imprint of the Penguin Group. History The company began as Wiley & Putnam with the 1838 partnership between George Palmer Putnam and J ...

. The role of de Camp, who was commissioned as a

ghost writer A ghostwriter is hired to write literary or journalistic works, speeches, or other texts that are officially credited to another person as the author. Celebrities, executives, participants in timely news stories, and political leaders often h ...

to recast Ronne's manuscript into publishable form, is uncredited. Ronne's working title was reportedly "Conquering the Antarctic".

Summary

The book relates the story of the

Ronne Antarctic Research Expedition The Ronne Antarctic Research Expedition (RARE) was an expedition from 1947–1948 which researched the area surrounding the head of the Weddell Sea in Antarctica. Background Finn Ronne led the RARE which was the final privately sponsored exp ...

, which researched the area surrounding the head of the

Weddell Sea The Weddell Sea is part of the Southern Ocean and contains the Weddell Gyre. Its land boundaries are defined by the bay formed from the coasts of Coats Land and the Antarctic Peninsula. The easternmost point is Cape Norvegia at Princess Martha ...

in Antarctica from 1947–1948.

Relationship to other works

De Camp's work with Ronne is reflected in two of his contemporary ''

Viagens Interplanetarias The ''Viagens Interplanetarias'' series is a sequence of science fiction stories by L. Sprague de Camp, begun in the late 1940s and written under the influence of contemporary space opera and sword and planet stories, particularly Edgar Rice ...

'' science fiction stories set on the fictional planet Krishna. One, the short story "

Calories The calorie is a unit of energy. For historical reasons, two main definitions of "calorie" are in wide use. The large calorie, food calorie, or kilogram calorie was originally defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of on ...

," adopts an Antarctic setting not utilized in any of the series's other stories; in the other, the novel '' The Hand of Zei'', the protagonist adopts the alias of an inhabitant of the planet's Antarctic and is, like de Camp, employed as a ghostwriter for his explorer boss.

Notes

External links

Book review in the ''Geographical Review'', v. 40, no. 1 (Jan. 1950), pp. 154-155
1949 non-fiction books Science books Books by L. Sprague de Camp Exploration of Antarctica Books about Antarctica {{geo-book-stub