A recent remark by Jules Verne's great-grandson would have struck a chord with Sir Ernest Shackleton. What, he was asked, would his grandfather have made of Richard Branson's round-the-world balloon attempt? Not much, was the gist of his reply: the great writer would probably be much more excited by attempts to reach Mars.
So it would have been with the British Polar explorer. No radar or electronic support for him when he took his ship the Endurance to the Antarctic. No helicopters waiting to pluck his crew to safety. Just human versus the elements.
Yet even then, in 1914, time was running out for the great explorers. There were peaks left to climb and tracts of African land still to be charted: no-one had yet rowed the Atlantic single-handed or sailed around the world alone. But most of the major feats of exploration had been accomplished.
Even the prize of the South Pole had just been snatched from British hands, with the death of Captain Robert Scott, who was beaten to the frozen landmark by the Norwegian Roald Amundsen and, unable to complete the trek back to safety, perished in his tent with his companions.
Shackleton too had tried and failed to reach the Pole. Now, as a sort of consolation prize, he was planning to traverse the Antarctic, a journey billed as the last great unclaimed prize.
The story has been told in detail before: how the ship, with its 21 crew and potential trekkers, dogs and supplies was marooned about 130 kilometres from the starting point by pack ice which first stopped its progress and then gradually trapped the wooden vessel in an unshakeable grip.