Endurance Book Report

 In Endurance by Alfred Lansing, Ernest Shackleton recruits a squad of 27 men to take on an extreme voyage. They started in the United Kingdom and planned on traveling all the way to South Georgia. Pretty early on in the book their ship had been crushed by ice and they had no choice but to abandon it. Their whole mission went out the window when this happened and now they were just trying to get to an island to be rescued. They missed that island and floated way past it and there were only two more islands they could possibly settle at before it was just open water. They were all in extremely small boats at this point and were hardly getting any sleep. Once they arrive at Elephant Island the crew created shelter there and eventually Shackleton decided to bring five men with him in a small boat to travel over 800 miles to South Georgia Island where they would hope to find rescue. On their way to South Georgia they encounter the Drake Passage which is one of the deadliest seas in the world, but they made it through all the way to South Georgia despite the small boat and treacherous weather. Once Shackleton got to South Georgia he got a big boat and went to rescue the rest of his crew and although it took a while he rescued all other crew members. Surprisingly, all of the 27 men they started the voyage with survived.

    The theme of this book that I took away from this was that no matter how difficult something may be whether its physical or mental, if you want something bad enough or are passionate about something you can achieve it as long as you never give up and keep trying. The crew members of this ship throughout the entire time displayed outstanding determination, grit and willpower to never give up no matter how terrible a situation got. This was the part I enjoyed most about the book which was just enjoying the pure motivation and courage that these men constantly had despite any circumstances. This book is truly an inspiration to me because it showed me that if I want something bad enough to never quit no matter how hard it gets because there is beauty in the struggle and it will all workout in the end.