Contents

PROLOGUE The Last of the Vikings

PART ONE

WEST

1 The Boy from the Mountain Kingdom

2 Polar Apprentice

3 An Extraordinary Plan

4 Where Franklin Died

5 An Education at Gjøahavn

PART TWO

SOUTH

6 “I Resolved Upon a Coup”

7 The Napoleon of the Poles

8 Dogs and Skis

9 A Featureless Expanse of Snow

PART THREE

EAST

10 A Hero Returns

11 A New Battlefield

12 The Frozen Reaches of Tartary

PART FOUR

NORTH

13 Grounded Dreams

14 The Arctic Phoenix

15 The Dirigible and the Fascist

16 A Massed Attack on the Polar Regions

PART FIVE

LOST

17 No More Poles to Conquer

EPILOGUE The End of the Heroic Age

A Note on Sources

Selected Bibliography

Acknowledgments

Photo Credits

Index

About the Author