Book 18 toppled – a tale of courage, adventure and survival

In the 1970s, when I was in my teens, there were many adventure/suspense books available to read which had been written after WW2 and which were, I think, mainly targeted at male readers. Authors of these books included Nevil Shute, Alistair McLean and Desmond Bagley. Lots of these books were available in my house and I read them all. They were like grown up versions of Enid Blyton’s adventure stories or the Biggles books which I had also read and enjoyed. These stories were very male focussed, often set somewhere in the remains of the British empire, and were full of bravery and daring exploits. An example of one of this type of book that I have read recently is reviewed here.

Hammond Innes was one of these authors and I have previously read his book Campbell’s Kingdom which is set in the Rocky Mountains. It was with a distant memory of enjoying his writing that I picked up The White South by Hammond Innes on the book table at my local Sainsbury’s in exchange for a donation to the store’s favourite charity. The book I acquired is an ancient hardback, probably printed in about 1979, which had been a library copy and then sold on to someone for the magnificent figure of 30 pence.

The story involves Duncan Craig who is at a loose end after the war (the book was written in 1948) and who decides to try and get a job in South Africa. He hitches a lift on a private plane owned by a man who has a fleet of whaling ships in the Antarctic and needs to get there urgently because a captain has died. Craig ends up captaining the ship which is waiting in Cape Town because it resembles one he commanded during the war. When they reach the ice there are problems – one person is dangerous, boats are sunk, and eventually Craig, and others, are stranded on the ice with no obvious means of survival. Craig takes charge and has to face the elements, almost certain death, some mutinous crew members and the murderous son of the owner. He also has to protect the owner’s daughter, with whom he has fallen in love.

This is a story of endurance, adventure and manly courage. It contains some ideas and themes that a modern reader might not be comfortable with – whaling as an acceptable activity, a class divide between the British officers and the Norwegian crew, a contempt for the Jewish character who is seen as weak and a scrounger, and the feeling that the woman always has to be protected. Once you’ve accepted this, however, it’s a fast-paced adventure story with plenty of tension which kept me gripped for the duration.

I wouldn’t want my reading diet to be full of this type of book anymore because my tastes have definitely become more diverse in the past 40 to 50 years, but I did enjoy it and I am glad that I read it. The physical book, however, has reached the end of its life. Whilst reading it many of the pages became detached from the binding and the rest look like they will soon meet the same fate. I have deposited this book in the bin because it cannot be read again, although I see that many of the author’s novels are now available on Kindle should I wish to read others in the future.