End of the Earth: Voyaging to Antarctica

End of the Earth brings to life the waters of the richest whale feeding grounds in the world the wandering albatross with its 11-foot wingspan arching through the sky and the habits of every variety of seal walrus petrel and penguin in the area all with boundless and contagious inquisitiveness. Magnificently written the bookevokes an appreciation and sympathy for a region as harsh as it is beautiful. Luminous and haunting . . . the contemporary Thoreau.The Wall Street Journal Matthiessen doesnt waste words and in End of the Earth: Voyages to Antarctica his homage to the austere splendor of that frozen continent he hasnt deployed a single one whose choice I would care to take issue with. . . . Matthiessen writes crusty chiseled sentences that demand to be read slowlythe perfect prose equivalent of the landscapes hes describing.The New York Times Book Review Matthiessen and polar landscapes seem perfectly suited. . . . I found myself constantly re-reading sentences or paragraphs to savour all of their rich resonances. . . . Few if any authors on the region have so successfully compressed . . . Antarctic life . . . and I suspect it will become standard reading.The Guardian