After the British ship Endurance (pictured above) became stuck in an ice sheet in the Weddell Sea off Antarctica in January 1915, the expedition’s official photographer, Frank Hurley, made a brave decision. He waded into the icy water filling the lower deck to rescue hundreds of his precious glass-plate photo negatives.

To Hurley’s dismay, Ernest Shackleton, the expedition leader, informed him he would have to abandon most of the negatives because they would weigh down their escape lifeboats. Hurley went through the plates one by one and smashed 400 of them on the ice before he could change his mind and risk his life to return for them, salvaging 120.

Hurley also had to relinquish most of his photography equipment and rely on a pocket camera and a few rolls of film to capture the crew’s fight for survival as they camped on the ice near their trapped ship for months. “It is beyond conception, even to us, that we are dwelling on a colossal ice raft, with but five feet of ice separating us from 2,000 fathoms of ocean, and drifting along under the caprices of wind and tides, to heaven knows where,” wrote Hurley in his diary.

The Endurance sank for good in November 1915. After months camped on the ice, in April 1916, Hurley and the rest of the crew took his fragile photo negatives and remaining supplies on lifeboats to the uninhabited Elephant Island. From there, realising there was little chance of rescue, Shackleton and five men took the James Caird lifeboat (pictured below) on a perilous journey of 1200 kilometres across the Southern Ocean to seek rescue in South Georgia, eventually rescuing the men (including Hurley) who had remained on Elephant Island in August 1916.

While stranded on the ice sheet in the Weddell Sea, Hurley proved to be a hardy survivor, fashioning a blubber stove from an old drum and eating the expedition’s sledge dogs when food supplies ran short. Pictured below is Leonard Hussey lifting the largest sledge dog, Samson.

Hurley, an Australian photographer, was recruited for the expedition to Antarctica after Shackleton saw a film he had made of Douglas Mawson’s earlier Australasian Antarctic Expedition, for which he was also the official photographer. Unfortunately, the Shackleton expedition never succeeded in crossing the Antarctic continent.

Now, the UK’s Royal Geographical Society, in collaboration with Shackleton’s granddaughter and others, has published , a compilation of Hurley’s images that survived. It features the original glass-plate negatives alongside new, high-definition scans that uncover previously hidden faces and details, such as in the image below. Digitisation of the negative revealed a sixth crew member, hidden behind the smoke from the stove.

“The survival of these negatives through such a journey in such conditions to reach the safety of the Royal Geographical Society’s collections is extraordinary,” says the society’s president, Jane Francis, in the book. “[Hurley’s] images are an example of documentary photography at its finest. He was committed to his craft and would often put himself in danger to create the perfect image. Each of his negatives is not just a visual record of a particular moment, but a beautifully composed, carefully considered piece of art.”

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Imagining things

Late last year, between one news event and another (honestly, who can remember?), Feedback was delighted to discover the . This is an online magazine publishing “short works of fiction”, but only if they take the form of “imaginary research abstracts”. In other words, it’s a collection of summaries of (entirely fictional) research studies, each of which is a little short story in disguise.

It’s the creation of two academics in the UK: at the University of Glasgow and at the University of Derby. It grew out of a workshop intended “to introduce creative writing concepts to researchers”, especially those “who felt tense, anxious, about writing, or had fallen into a negative relationship with their writing” – in other words, an aid for professionals with writer’s block. But, like the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it has grown beyond all expectations and is now a venue for rather lateral short stories.

The came out in late June. Reader Alex Gough alerted us to it, having published in it himself “after strenuous peer review”. Alex’s piece is titled “Seven new examples of adaptive radiation and insular dwarfism in etapods”. He begins by explaining that “Insular dwarfism is a process in which species isolated on islands evolve to become smaller than their mainland counterparts, eg Lemerle’s hippopotamus.” From there he goes on to describe seven miniature species from a fictional archipelago, each of which has “developed behavioural traits suited to [its] unique environment”.

For instance, “Etapodus malevolus is notably belligerent”, in response to “the high prevalence of predators on its island”. In contrast, “Etapodus somnolentus undergoes prolonged periods of hibernation to cope with its irregular food supply.”

However, not all the species could be explained in this kind of adaptive evolutionary language. “Etapodus jucundus is habitually carefree and contented, for reasons we have not yet discovered.”

We assume readers have got the joke by now. If not, go sweep the floor and whistle while you work, maybe it’ll become clear.

Elsewhere in the issue, we find “Move fast and break everything: Deflecting anxiety in a tech-forward world”. It explains: “For unclear reasons, the rapid-fire continuous release of life-altering and world-transforming technological developments in artificial intelligence, without oversight of any kind, has caused an increase in anxiety, with some people even proving inexplicably resistant to emerging technologies.”

Fortunately, a solution is at hand. “The use of AI technologies reduces prefrontal cortex activity and critical thinking”, which may lead to “brain atrophy, and therefore a reduction in distracting ethical questions”. The problem solves itself!

Etymological issues

Feedback is on a mission to get the word “nonomatopoeia” added to the dictionary. Attentive readers will recall that the neologism was proposed by Neil McKay and means the opposite of onomatopoeia, i.e. it is a word that doesn’t sound at all like the thing it describes.

Several readers have submitted additional examples of nonomatopoeia, bolstering the evidence that the word would be a valuable addition to the language because it describes a widespread phenomenon. Elaine Coates says she has always struggled with “pedagogy”. It refers to the method and practice of teaching, but, she says, “it sounds like some sort of foot fetish”.

Likewise, Bob Munro nominates “valetudinarian”. It sounds like a religious order, but actually refers to “a person who is chronically sick, or believes themselves to be”. These two alternative meanings, incidentally, are so radically distinct they render the word effectively useless.

In a nicely meta twist, Sue Tudor says that “onomatopoeia” is itself an example of nonomatopoeia. She describes “onomatopoeia” as “surely one of the most non-onomaterwhatsit words in existence”, because the sequence of syllables suggests “standing or sitting on a mat on a pier”.

There is, we should say, a question about the etymology of nonomatopoeia, which computer scientist has flagged. “May I be the 94th reader to point out that onomatopoeia is Greek, so its negation is anonomatopoeia, not nonomatopoeia,” he writes. “The opposite, rather than the negation, is antonomatopoeia.”

We regret to inform Julian that he is so far the only reader to point this out, but if another 93 would care to write in making this same argument, we will place all this correspondence in one of our special folders.

Rats on parade

Our quest for the most niche scientific tourist attractions continues, with museums of grain and gas setting the pace.

Simon Goodman reports having found “a lovely example” in Siem Reap, Cambodia, which is the jumping-off point to visit the Angkor temple complex. There he found a for the charity APOPO, which uses trained African giant pouched rats to detect landmines. “This is a must-see place,” says Simon. “The highlight is seeing how the rats are trained and search out mines, which the carers show you live.”

If that weren’t enough, if you agree to remove potentially toxic substances like sun cream from your skin, “You are even allowed to cuddle the rats.” They are cat-sized and “delightful”, Simon reports.

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