For Glory, Not Gold (French edition : Là où le temps et la glace sont les seuls maîtres) recounts a gripping tale of nineteenth-century exploration in the Arctic — a realm where only ice and time held dominion. Beautifully illustrated, with artwork by the explorers themselves, it retraces the journeys of ten remarkable navigators, all of them fascinated by the elusive Northwest Passage — that perilous maritime route so long concealed by the icebound waters between Europe and Asia.

 

The book relives the everyday existence of such famous British explorers as Sir Edward Parry and Sir John Franklin, leader of a lost expedition that inspired sailors far and wide to join in the search for his missing crews. Among them were Dr. John Rae and Sir Leopold McClintock, but also American adventurers Dr. Elisha Kent Kane and Charles Francis Hall, whose death remains a mystery more than 150 years later. Trapped in the ice for months on end, it was largely thanks to the wisdom and generosity of the Inuit — resilient masters of Arctic survival — that these men lived to tell their tale.

 

Replete with previously unpublished documents and maps, For Glory, Not Gold brings to life a land at the crossroads of dreams and science, where adventure lies around every icy corner. A tribute to pioneering polar exploration, this book also gives shape to the enduring mythos of the Arctic.