Wilderness
Franklin’s unsatisfied thirst for knowledge.
Before discovering the Franklin’s Expedition, I only knew the most famous Shackleton’s Endurance Expedition, occurred in 1914–17, crossing of Antarctica from sea to sea, via the pole, that became trapped in pack ice. I read Alfred Lansing’s book “Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage to the Antarctic” and I was shocked by the incredible captain’s story. But, clearly, not only my mind was involved in this extreme adventure. My seven years old child also studied at school this historical episode. Even a great Italian artist has dedicated a song to this great pathfinder. Who better than Franco Battiato, huge music explorer, could dedicate a piece to Shackleton?
No one ever talked about Franklin’s expedition. Until now.
No one knew the real history of the two English ships’ crew embarked in an Arctic exploration in search of a Northwest Passage in 1845, until 2014, when an expedition led by Parks Canada discovered the wreck of HMS Erebus in the the Canadian Arctic Archipelago and in 2016, when HMS Terror was found in further north.
After this discovery it was organized, in 2017, an extraordinary exhibition in London, Death in the ice, at Greenwich National Maritime Museum, in which were put together the witnesses and the finds.
Inuit have been, for years, the only custodians of the secret of their disappearance.
I have learned to love Inuit reading Robert Peroni’s book: “Dove il vento grida più forte” ( I didn’t find an English translation, unfortunately, ndr). And I found their spirit into the description of their meeting with the explorers.
It is incredible how the indomitable nature can make people ‘alien’ on earth. These are the Inuit.
And this is the place where ‘humans’ attempted their skills.
I cannot even imagine the unknowable fear and the deep loneliness in which they lived and died. I only feel on my body the frost that creeps into my limbs while I watch into Franklin’s blue eyes and I only find the magnificence of the human mind.
The Inuit understand this chill and know how far the human mind can go without madden. For this reason they were not believed, and was even involved Charles Dikens to rebut the voices about cannibalism. It was easier to imagine the Inuit as murderers than civilized people as cannibals.
I prefer to imagine the reality and to feel the desperateness to let nature take its course. This is forerunner main challenge.
