Man Against Nature

From Pliny the Younger's eyewitness description of the eruption of Vesuvius to a brilliant scholar's death from radiation poisoning, this remarkable collection of 46 firsthand accounts encompasses man's struggle to survive and conquer the forces of nature: earthquakes, bubonic plague, cataclysmic fires, blizzards, tidal waves, floods, deadly insects, and waterspouts. Within these pages, readers can experience living for 45 seconds in a tornado, standing triumphant at the North Pole, battling a whale, bailing out of a plane at supersonic speed, crossing 800 miles of Antarctic sea in an open boat, and other exploits. Contributors include Roald Amundsen, Ernest Hemingway, Sir Edmund Hillary, Jaques-Yves Cousteau, Herodotus, Thor Heyerdahl, Charles Lindbergh, Sir Ernest Shackleton, and Orville Wright.