Famous Travellers – Stanfords Blog

The White Ladder: Triumph and Tragedy at the Dawn of Mountaineering by Daniel Light

In his book The White Ladder: Triumph and Tragedy at the Dawn of Mountaineering, Daniel Light uncovers the true story of the thrill-seekers, map-makers, soldiers, occultists, artists and porters who paved the way for modern mountaineering. Ahead of his event here at Stanfords, Covent Garden on Thursday 21st November, Daniel gives us a snippet of mountaineering history as he looks at some attempts at the Himalayan region.

-by Daniel Light

The American climber and explorer Fanny Bullock Workman arrived in Darjeeling in the dying days of the nineteenth century intent on leading an expedition into the heart of the Sikkim Himalaya. There, she and her husband Hunter hoped to reach record-breaking heights on some of the highest mountains on Earth.

The Challenger Expedition: Exploring the Ocean’s Depths by Dr Erika Jones

This article is an edited introduction from The Challenger Expedition: Exploring the Ocean’s Depths by Dr Erika Jones, Curator of Navigation at Royal Museums Greenwich.

The book was published to mark the 150th anniversary of the expedition’s launch.

On the 21 December 1872, HMS Challenger set sail from Portsmouth, England, to begin a global voyage of deep-sea exploration. A landmark endeavour, the findings and the legacy shaped the development of ocean science as we know it and are still influential in our understanding of the planet today.

With technological and scientific developments of the time, supported by extensive international cooperation and a team of research and naval officers, the expedition was part of the concerted nineteenth-century drive to map the ocean floors and search for life in the abyss.

When the ship returned to Britain in 1876, the scientific team on board had amassed the then largest collection of examples of life from the deep sea. Over the next two decades, a global network of researchers prepared the results for publication culminating in a series of works that is considered the intellectual foundation of modern oceanography.

HMS Challenger under sail passing ice bergs during the oceanographic expedition’s visit to Antarctica, attributed to William Frederick Mitchell, 1880
© National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Extract: Exploring The World by Alexander Maitland

Filled with epic tales of endurance and perseverance, Exploring The World: Two Centuries Of Remarkable Adventurers And Their Journeys by Alexander Maitland celebrates a group of exceptional individuals possessed of indomitable courage, boundless determination and adventurous spirit. It portrays a variety of fascinating lives driven by curiosity, wanderlust and the pursuit of knowledge – and, in doing so, provides a unique overview of two centuries of exploration. Here is an extract about one of the most well-known explorers, Sir Douglas Mawson.

The Story of Tutankhamun

By Garry Shaw, author of The Story of Tutankhamun: An Intimate Life of the Boy Who Became King.

It has been one hundred years since Howard Carter discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings. Famous today mainly because of his treasures, the boy king is often dismissed as an unimportant pharaoh, but this is far from correct. He lived through a turbulent time in Egyptian history, and helped to steer his country back to normality. Here’s five fascinating facts about Tutankhamun that give us an insight into his life and times.

Nellie Bly: Back on the map at the RGS

By Rosemary J Brown, author of Following Nellie Bly: Her Record-Breaking Race Around the World.

Nellie Bly fans unite! The life and lessons of the intrepid journalist will take centre stage in the Royal Geographical Society’s Ondaatje Theatre when BBC news presenter Martine Croxall delivers ‘Investigating Nellie Bly: reflections on journalism and the power of curiosity’ for the Monday night lecture on 26 September.

The Amur River by Colin Thubron in pictures

Rising in the Mongolian mountains and flowing through Siberia to the Pacific, the Amur River forms the tense border between Russia and China. This is the most densely fortified frontier on Earth.

In his eightieth year, Colin Thubron takes a dramatic and often treacherous journey from the Amur’s secret source to its giant mouth, covering almost 3,000 miles. Harassed by injury and by arrest from the local police, he makes his way along both the Russian and Chinese shores. By the time he reaches the river’s desolate end, a whole, pivotal world has come alive.

To celebrate the paperback launch of the 2022 Stanford Dolman winning The Amur River by Colin Thubron here are some photographs taken on the journey.

Launch of Journeys

Online event to celebrate the Launch of John Murray Journeys

On July 11th 2022 we teamed up with John Murray Press for an online event celebrating the republication of three titles for their Journeys series: In a Land Far from Home by Syed Mujtaba Ali, introduced by Taran Khan; Desert Soul by Isabelle Eberhardt, introduced by William Atkins; and Through Khiva to Golden Samarkand by Ella Christie, introduced by Caroline Eden.

The event was hosted by Nick Hunt (author of Outlandish) with Edward Stanford Travel Writing Award-winning authors; William Atkins, Taran Khan and Caroline Eden who introduce us to these three remarkable stories, sharing with us the reasons they love them and reading some short extracts. We were also joined by translator Nazes Afroz who translated In a Land Far from Home from Bengali to English.

Remembering Dervla Murphy

At the Edward Stanford Travel Writing Awards in March we awarded Hilary Bradt with the Outstanding Contribution to Travel Writing Award. The previous year’s recipient of this award, Dervla Murphy, sent this message to Hilary from her home in Ireland for us to read out at the awards;

“When we first met in an Andean hut in 1979 I had one of those instant reactions- a kindred spirit. During the subsequent decades Hilary, as both a traveller and writer, has provided invaluable guidance and encouragement to generations of young travellers uninterested in beaten tracks. Congratulations of your award Hilary.”

Here Hilary Bradt pays tribute to a great travel writer and a special friend for 40 years.

-by Hilary Bradt

On May 5 I received an email from Dervla’s friend and PR, Steph Allen, with this message: “I’ve just spoken to Dervla who is not at all well. She has heart failure and believes that she is (in her own words) on her way out. I asked if there was anyone she’d like me to let know and she asked if I could send you a message to say thank you for everything you have done for her over the years”. This unwarranted thoughtfulness and generosity personifies this extraordinary woman who died on May 22, and who I first met in 1979 in an Ecuadorian hostal (the sort with no hot water, $3 a night, with rooms clustered around a courtyard). She was returning from Peru, which would (eventually) result in Eight Feet in the Andes and George and I were researching our guide to Backpacking in Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador – the third in our fledgling backpacking series. I, like so many other young travellers, had been inspired by Dervla’s early books, in my case Full Tilt and In Ethiopia with a Mule, and was awe-struck to meet such a famous writer. The awe was diluted by a shared bottle of local rum, but the admiration grew steadily throughout our 44-year friendship.

Women’s History Month: Exploring Female Travellers

By Rosemary J Brown

Women in history shouldn’t be a mystery … and that includes female travellers. Challenged by traditions that placed them firmly in the home, these women burst through social and geographical boundaries to explore, experience and document the world.

Women like intrepid explorer Isabella Bird (1831–1904), queen of the desert Gertrude Bell (1868–1926) who mapped out Iraq, and wayfaring biologist Mary Kingsley (1862–1900). They all left their inhibitions at home and journeyed into the unknown alone. But the female traveller I know best of all is trailblazing journalist Nellie Bly (1864-1922) who circled the world faster than anyone ever had – 72 days – in 1890.

EXPLORER: the Quest for Adventure and the Great Unknown by Benedict Allen

– by Benedict Allen

This is the story of an extraordinary quest by a lone explorer, one that ends dramatically, deep in the heart of New Guinea. But it’s also a story about all of us – for we all have dreams and challenges, and we are all explorers of our world.