I’ve been reading a curious book called As Told at The Explorers Club. It’s a collection of stories mainly having to do with exploration and adventure, but frankly the types of stories are pretty varied. There’s one fairly cute one about the discovery of the coelacanth, but it’s not really an “adventure.” In the introduction, editor George Plimpton claims they are all “true-life” stories. Sometimes this seems very hard to believe, but who knows.

But for me, the most remarkable story I’ve read so far is one entitled “Arctic Ghost”, by Felix Riesenberg. It’s almost indescribable–the writing is so vivid, mystical and powerful, and the subject matter so bizarre, I am forced to assume it is at least a bit embellished. But what a story! It is an eerie tale that I doubt Poe or even Lovecraft himself could have dreamed up. The atmosphere of the tale is amazing.

I have tried to find out more about this Riesenberg guy and this story, but so far I haven’t found much. I have decided that, since he was apparently an arctic explorer, he should have signed his name as “F. Riesenberg”–pronounced “freezin’ berg”.

Sorry about that. I don’t know what came over me.