On 14 December 1911, the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen and his team became the first human beings to reach the South Pole, just over a month before Robert Falcon Scott`s ill-fated Terra Nova expedition. Amundsen had already led the first expedition to traverse the North West Passage, and would go on to lead the first successful attempt to cross the Arctic by air (perhaps even becoming the first to reach the North Pole, according to some interpretations). Yet his personal life was complex to say the least, with a string of mistresses, including Eskimo girls he brought back to Norway, and a poisonous relationship with his brother. He disappeared in 1928 while taking part in an airborne rescue mission in the Arctic; his body was never found. Written by acclaimed Norwegian author Tor Bomann-Larsen, and with a foreword by Polar explorer Pen Hadow, this compelling biography - the first of its kind to be published in English - draws on an incredible discovery of over 15,000 letters and papers in a barn outside Oslo and looks beyond the familiar image of the hero.Together with vivid first-hand accounts from Amundsen and his crew, the explorer`s life is revealed to an extent that has never before been possible.