The Endurance: How to Captain a Ship Like Shackleton

In 1914, Ernest Shackleton set out to make the first land crossing of Antarctica. His ship never reached the continent. Within months, the Endurance was crushed by sea ice, leaving 28 men stranded in one of the most hostile environments on earth, with no hope of rescue. Historian of polar exploration Henrietta Hammant joins Hugh to unpick the legend of Shackleton: his rivalry with Scott, the 5,000 men who applied for a voyage into the unknown, and the extraordinary 800-nautical-mile lifeboat crossing to South Georgia that should, by any reasonable measure, have failed. But this episode asks a harder question: what does it mean to lead when everything has already gone wrong? And what can a century-old survival story teach us about the kind of leadership we actually want today? The Art of Adventure is brought to you by Arthur Beale, outfitters to sailors, adventurers and explorers for nearly 500 years. Find out more at arthurbeale.co.uk.