Celebrity and Polar Exploration : Making French Polar Explorers, 1860-1930s / Alexandre Simon-Ekeland.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Simon-Ekeland, Alexandre, author.

Series:

Arctic Humanities ; 4.

Literature and Cultural Studies E-Books Online, Collection 2026.

Arctic Humanities ; 4

Literature and Cultural Studies E-Books Online, Collection 2026

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Literature and Cultural Studies.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (314 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Other Title:

Making French Polar Explorers, 1860-1930s

Place of Publication:

Leiden ; Boston : BRILL, 2026.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

This book analyses various French polar expedition projects that were proposed between the 186s and the late 193s, comparing the projects that led to expeditions with those that did not. It shows that the successful would-be explorers had to become famous first, before they could secure support and funding for their plans. Explorers were “made” partly by themselves, but also largely through the efforts of the many others who promoted their plans: armchair scientists and geographers, journalists, politicians, and common citizens, all of whom contributed to the formation of a French culture of polar exploration.

Contents:

Front Cover

Half Title

Series Informations

Title Page

Copyrights Page

Contents

Acknowledgements

Figures and Maps

Figures

Maps

Abbreviations and Notes on Terminology

Introduction

1 The Polar Regions in the Geographical Imagination

2 Heroised Explorers in a Celebrity Society

3 Actors of Exploration

4 Structure of the Book

Part 1: Introduction to Part 1

1 Making an Explorer

1 The Pre-Arctic Gustave Lambert and His Interest in the North Pole

2 An "Apostle of Science" with "Scientific and National Considerations of the Highest Order"

2.1 Lambert's Map

2.2 The Open Polar Sea

2.3 A Colonial Project

3 A Successfully Self-Proclaimed Polar Expert

3.1 Arctic Experience and Lack Thereof

3.2 Gustave Lambert, "Explorer of the North Pole"

4 Conclusion: Becoming an Explorer

2 Funding Lambert's Polar Crusade

1 Support and Control: the Société de Géographie and Lambert's Project

1.1 A Subscription and Committees

1.2 Lambert's Ship and the Tensions with the sg

2 Lambert's Lectures

2.1 Networking

2.2 Lambert's Lectures

2.3 Masculinity On- and Off-Stage

3 A Popular Success?

3.1 Subscribing as an Individual and Collecting Practice

3.2 The sg, Lambert and the Press

3.3 Fundraising Events

4 Politics and Funding

4.1 The Unavoidable Political Context

4.2 Politics as Lambert's Last Resort

5 Lambert's Death

6 Conclusion

Conclusion to Part 1: Lessons from an Expedition That Never Sailed

Part 2: Assessing Polar Exploration, 1870-1900s

Introduction to Part 2

3 Polar Visions: Imagining Polar Nature and the Uses of the Polar Regions

1 A Space for Economy? The Polar Regions out of the French Colonial Imaginary

1.1 Gustave Ambert

1.2 Geography and Colonialism in France in the Late Nineteenth Century.

1.3 The Polar Regions in the French Press

2 A Space for What Science? Moving and Studying in the Polar Regions

2.1 Polar Ballooning Projects

2.2 The First International Polar Year (1882-1883)

3 Conclusion

4 Polar Materialities: Collecting and Displaying

1 Polar Objects as a Scientific Currency

1.1 A Collecting Conflict: Georges Pouchet in Northern Norway in 1881

1.2 Collecting as Career-Building: Charles Rabot's Travels in Northern Europe in the 1880s

2 Displaying the Polar without Explorers

2.1 Displaying Ice, Animals and Polar Resources

2.2 Displaying Polar People

3 Displaying Polar Explorers

4 Conclusion

5 Polar Stories: Narrating the Polar Regions

1 "Noise" in the Media: a Mission to Jan Mayen, 1891-1892

1.1 The 1891 Attempt

1.2 The 1892 Success

2 Mediators of Polar Stories

2.1 Wilfrid de Fonvielle and Charles Rabot

2.2 Authors, Translators, Editors

3 Real and Fictional Polar Stories and Their Readers

3.1 Travel Periodicals

3.2 Fictional and Actual Travel Accounts

3.3 Travel Periodicals and Their Audiences

Conclusion to Part 2: Assessing Polar Expeditions

Part 3: Charcot's Antarctic Expeditions 1900-1912

Introduction to Part 3

6 Jean-Baptiste Charcot's First Antarctic Expedition

1 More French People in the Arctic

1.1 Polar Tourism

1.2 Aristocrat-Sponsored Research

1.3 Charcot

2 The Preparation of Charcot's First Antarctic Expedition

2.1 A Well-Supported Arctic Project

2.2 From the Arctic to the Antarctic

2.3 Le Matin's Subscription

3 The Expedition

3.1 In South America

3.2 In Antarctica

4 The Return to France and Charcot's Public Persona

4.1 The Return to France

4.2 Scientist and Explorer: Charcot's Changing Celebrity

5 Conclusion

7 Charcot's Second Antarctic Expedition.

1 France, Charcot and International Cooperation

1.1 France and the Failures of the Polar Congresses and Commissions

1.2 A Very British French Expedition

2 Charcot's Second Expedition

2.1 An Easy Funding Process for France's Main Polar Explorer

2.2 To the Antarctic Again

3 Sport and Science: Charcot in the Race to the South Pole

3.1 Cook, Peary and the Discovery of the North Pole

3.2 "No, No! We Have Not Had Adventures": Charcot's Return to France

3.3 The Discovery of the South Pole

Conclusion to Part 3: Jean-Baptiste Charcot, the French Polar Explorer

Part 4: Reinventing Polar Exploration (1913-1939)

Introduction to Part 4

8 Faster Expeditions and News: Technological Reinventions of Polar Exploration in the 1920s

1 Faster Expeditions: French Polar Flight Projects in the 1920s

1.1 Technology at the Service of Science: the Pre-War Projects of Jules de Payer

1.2 From Science to a "Raid": Jules de Payer's Post-War Projects

1.3 "Fifteen French Aviators to the North Pole": Other Projects in Competition (1924-1927)

2 Faster Information: Polar News in France in 1928

2.1 Radio's Effectiveness

2.2 Losses of Contact

2.3 Bringing the Information to the French Public

9 Film, Ethnology and Colonialism: France and the Greenlandic Inuit in the Interwar Years

1 Nanook and Charcot: the Popularity of the Inuit in France in the 1920s

1.1 Polar Movies

1.2 Charcot Goes to Greenland

2 French Slow Expeditions to Greenland in the 1930s

2.1 Franco-Danish Collaboration and the Second International Polar Year

2.2 Paul-Emile Victor

3 The Inuit in French Debates on Colonialism in the 1930s

10 Making Polar Exploration Unexceptional: Charcot and Oceanography in the Interwar Period

1 Polar Exploration as Oceanography.

2 "A Civilian Hero: the Commandant Charcot Died for Science and the Homeland"

Conclusion to Part 4: French Polar Exploration Reinvented

Conclusion

1 Whose Success?

2 Expeditions as Events

3 A French Culture of Polar Exploration

Archival Sources

Periodicals

Bibliography

Index

Back Cover.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9789004762145

OCLC:

1600522351

Publisher Number:

10.1163/9789004762145 DOI