The Last Imaginary Place: A Human History of the Arctic World

Kerry Abel is a professor of history at Carleton University. She is the author of Drum Songs: Glimpses of Dene History, co-editor of Aboriginal Resource Use in Canada: Historical and Legal Aspects, and co-editor of Northern Visions: New Perspectives on the North in Canadian History.

In recent years there has been an explosion of interest in Arctic
history among both scholars and northern communities. This book, written
by an archaeologist with many year’s experience at the Canadian Museum
of Civilization, provides an accessible starting point for the general
reader. Part travelogue, part popular archaeology, part historical
anecdote, it ranges widely over time and around the circumpolar world,
telling stories of the land and the many peoples who have lived in,
explored, or exploited the Arctic. The book is particularly well
produced with quality paper, rich colour photographs, and a readable
typeface showcasing a text that is largely free of typographical errors.


Perhaps the greatest strength of the book is its circumpolar coverage,
bringing together information from Russia, Scandinavia, Greenland, and
North America in a way that is almost never attempted. And although the
author is a professional archaeologist, the latest scholarly
interpretations in that field are presented clearly and without a hint
of specialist jargon. There is a short but helpful annotated list of
suggestions for further reading.

Parts of the book are less successful than others. There are lengthy
sections that would fit more properly into a study of subarctic history,
and clearly the author is less familiar with this topic, for there are a
number of factual errors and misleading descriptions, including a
curious identification of “Innu” territory on two maps. Oddly, the
author appears to have made no use of the recent growing body of
scholarly historical literature on the north.

This is not a “history” in the sense of a sequentially narrated
storyline. Rather, it is a more episodic and sometimes scattered series
of forays into the rich texture of Arctic experience, past and present.
Despite the rough spots, this book is a good introduction to the
circumpolar world for the general reader.