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Access All Areas: Selected Writings 1990-2010
In a series of remarkable books ? Travels in a Thin Country, Terra Incognita, A Life of Apsley Cherry Garrard, Too Close to the Sun and The Magnetic North ? Sara Wheeler has shown that she is not only one of the finest travel writers of her generation but a very fine biographer too. Published to coincide with her fiftieth birthday, Access All Areas gathers together a selection of her shorter pieces, both journalism and introductions to other books.As one would expect, the frozen poles of the earth feature often, whether she is spending the night in Captain Scott?s hut or reliving the adventures of Shackleton and Nansen. But its hot places feature too ? Malawi, Kerala, Cuba and Bangladesh. She writes brilliantly of her heroes ? Mary Kingsley, Fanny Trollope, Norman Lewis, Jan Morris and Sybille Bedford ? and about the pains and pleasures of writing biography. Worried that having her children would end her roaming, she took her children with her, to the Arctic, and on a brilliantly depicted cruise on the QE2. She learns to bellydance, to strip, and to walk on the wing of a biplane at 3000 feet.This is an immensely varied and satisfying collection.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published March 31, 2011
About the author
Sara Wheeler
27 books124 followersSara Wheeler was brought up in Bristol and studied Classics and Modern Languages at Brasenose College, University of Oxford. After writing about her travels on the Greek island of Euboea and in Chile, she was accepted by the US National Science Foundation as their first female writer-in-residence at the South Pole, and spent seven months in Antarctica.
In her resultant book Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica, she mentioned sleeping in the captain’s bunk in Scott's Hut. Whilst in Antarctica she read The Worst Journey in the World, an account of the Terra Nova Expedition, and she later wrote a biography of its author Apsley Cherry-Garrard.
In 1999 she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. From 2005 to 2009 she served as Trustee of the London Library.
She was frequently abroad for two years, travelled to Russia, Alaska, Greenland, Canada and North Norway to write her book The Magnetic North: Travels in the Arctic. A journalist at the Daily Telegraph in the UK called it a "snowstorm of historical, geographical and anthropological facts".
In a 2012 BBC Radio 4 series: To Strive and Seek, she told the personal stories of five various members of the Terra Nova Expedition.
O My America!: Second Acts in a New World records the lives of women who travelled to America in the first half of the 19th Century: Fanny Trollope, Fanny Kemble, Harriet Martineau, Rebecca Burlend, Isabella Bird, and Catherine Hubback, and the author's travels in pursuit of them.
In her resultant book Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica, she mentioned sleeping in the captain’s bunk in Scott's Hut. Whilst in Antarctica she read The Worst Journey in the World, an account of the Terra Nova Expedition, and she later wrote a biography of its author Apsley Cherry-Garrard.
In 1999 she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. From 2005 to 2009 she served as Trustee of the London Library.
She was frequently abroad for two years, travelled to Russia, Alaska, Greenland, Canada and North Norway to write her book The Magnetic North: Travels in the Arctic. A journalist at the Daily Telegraph in the UK called it a "snowstorm of historical, geographical and anthropological facts".
In a 2012 BBC Radio 4 series: To Strive and Seek, she told the personal stories of five various members of the Terra Nova Expedition.
O My America!: Second Acts in a New World records the lives of women who travelled to America in the first half of the 19th Century: Fanny Trollope, Fanny Kemble, Harriet Martineau, Rebecca Burlend, Isabella Bird, and Catherine Hubback, and the author's travels in pursuit of them.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 23, 2018
Loved it, but then I always love Sara Wheeler's work. I've had a slight Antarctica obsession, ever since I read Terra Incognita!
October 17, 2018
The most insightful and courageous travel / conservation / history book I've read. From "Kerala: Killing Elephants and How to Avoid It", "It was one damned thing after another in the igloo. You struggle out the bag to solve one problem, and a battalion of others queue up for recognition", role models of travel writing, and many, many more stories told with intelligence.
July 24, 2013
In this collection of her best essays, travel writer Sara Wheeler shows how she has used extreme travel as a means to explore her inner landscape. From the Arctic to Tierra del Fuego, she covers all the globe and most of her roots and even the nature of rootlessness.
May 13, 2016
Not as good as her travel books
I am a great fan of Sara Wheeler but this book disappoints. When she writes of her travels, the words sparkle with life. When she reviews the works of other authors it immediately puts.me to sleep.
I am a great fan of Sara Wheeler but this book disappoints. When she writes of her travels, the words sparkle with life. When she reviews the works of other authors it immediately puts.me to sleep.
August 26, 2014
I have always enjoyed her writing so it was a treat to find this collection of personal essays.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews