Over the years, I've come to acquire all sorts of oddities and ephemera relating to the Franklin expedition, including chapbooks, newspaper articles, trading cards, and even toys (in the form of a lovely replica miniature can of poisoned beef, complete with box and informative notes -- it will be the subject of my next posting). But by far the rarest and most curious printed item is this tiny book, Erebo y Terror, published as part of a "Library of Micronesia" by Juan Miguel Muñoz, who at the time (2004) worked at the Spanish branch of Random House publishers. The book, bound in red, is accompanied by a small leaflet and a copy of Beard's daguerreotype of James Fitzjames, which themselves are contained in a CD jewel box, on which a tiny miniature compass is mounted (see photo). Both are enclosed in a slipcase featuring the logo of the Library, a tooth with the motto "De la pulcra Ceniza," which as far as I can make out with my limited Spanish, means "a little bit of ash."I do wish I had better Spanish, as the book itself is entirely written in that language. Happily, the accompanying materials, including a little sheet of glassine which is folded inside the cover, have both English and Spanish texts. The publisher informed me that the book's first three sections -- Introducción, Prólogo, and Los pergamos del cabo Félix -- are fiction, and intoduce a fabulous manuscript said to be found among Franklin's relics, written by Paco Alarcón. The latter parts -- Mallory y Hatteras and El Paso del Noroeste -- are nonfictional accounts of the search for the Passage from Frobisher to Amundsen. According to the publisher, Franklin was never a major figure of interest in Spain, which was why this limited edition of 250 had, as of the time of his writing, not sold a single copy; 50 were sent as gifts, of which mine is numbered (paradoxically) A63. It seems like the sort of little book that might have been imagined by Jorge Luis Borges, and lain on a shelf between a Wycliffe bible and the Book of Sand -- and yet here it is, in my hand.
If anyone knows more about this curious volume, I'd be very happy to hear from them! I'll be featuring a different item from my collections every week or so, so if Arctic cabinets of curiosity stir your interest, do 'stay tuned'!
