1. High Adventure
by Edmund Hillary. Oxford University Press. In 1953, when he was thirty-three years old, Edmund Hillary became the first man to stand at the summit of Mount Everest, the Holy Grail for a generation of mountain climbers who had tried and failed to reach the highest point on earth (29,035 feet).
2. First Impressions: Antarctica 1773-1930 Travelers' Tales
by Douglas R. G. Sellick (Editor). Fremantle Arts Centre Press. Antarctica is still a place of mystery after all these years. It still exists in almost completely pristine condition, but there are many stories to tell about the people who have ventured there... In this new book, Douglas R.G. Sellick gathers some of the most memorable accounts of Antarctica exploration.3. The Essential Lewis and Clark
by Langdon Y. Jones. HarperCollins. The adventures of Lewis and Clark are filled with danger and excitment--with a huge portion of hardship. Experience the Great Plains, the Rocky Mountains and western rivers the way Lewis and Clark first observed them: majestic, pristine, uncharted, and awe-inspiring. Become witness to wonders no European-Americans had seen before.
4. My Life as an Explorer
by Sven Hedin. National Geographic Society. Over the course of three decades in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Swedish geographer and explorer Sven Hedin traveled Central Asia's ancient Silk Road, along the way discovering lost cities, mapping uncharted rivers, and seeing more of 'the roof of the world' than any European before him.
5. Sailing Alone Around the World
by Joshua Slocum. Dover. First published in 1900, Sailing Alone Around the World is Captain Joshua Slocum's epic personal account of his solitary three-year voyage-a first in circumnavigation. Read more about adventure on the high seas, complete with encounters with the great, the humble, and the eccentric.
6. The Mammoth Book of Endurance and Adventure
by A. E. van Vogt. Carroll & Graf Publishers. Fifty vivid true-life accounts from the Great Age of Exploration, in the words of the intrepid adventurers who survived to tell the tale.
7. Exploration and Exchange: A South Seas Anthology, 1680-1900
by Jonathan Lamb (Editor), Nicholas Thomas (Editor), and Vanessa Smith (Editor). University of Chicago Press. Some of the narratives come from familiar chroniclers, e.g., Captain Cook, Mark Twain, and Robert Louis Stevenson, but most are from the bold souls who set forth to Oceania as mariners, missionaries, and explorers.
8. Worst Journey in the World
by Apsley Cherry-Garrard. Simon & Schuster. Cherry-Garrard, who accompanied Robert Falcon Scott to the Antarctic on the explorer's doomed quest for the South Pole, recounts the unforgettable journey across forbidding, inhospitable terrain. He was also a member of the search party that ultimately discovered Scott's frozen body along with his last notebook entries.
9. Mystery, Beauty, and Danger: Literature of the Mountains and Mountain
by Robert H. Bates. Peter E. Randall Publisher. This book collects the mountain literature of Auden, Arnold, Keats, Wordsworth, Shelley, Whymper, and Younghusband. "Mystery, Beauty, and Danger" includes drawings and photographs, as it details the evolution of writings about mountains.10. Starlight and Storm: The Conquest for the Great North Faces of Alps
by Gaston Rebuffat, Jon Krakauer (Editor). Random House. Known for his lyrical writing and his ability to convey not only the dangers of mountaineering but the pure exaltation of the climb, Gaston Rebuffat is among the most well-known and revered Alpinists of all time.
