The greatest wilderness on earth, the circumpolar Arctic has for centuries stirred our imagination and challenged us to explore its vast lands and seas. 'The Arctic World' captures the spirit of this most northerly frontier — the majesty of its landscapes the beauty of its plants and animals, the remarkable history of its peoples.

Encompassing the northern reaches of seven countries and an area of 28 million square miles, the Arctic is, in fact, one natural realm where plants, animals and humans have learned to live in a hostile climate. Its expanses of land and water, however, are not always the barren tracts of popular myth. There are towering mountain ranges, the largest forest in the world, spectacular displays of flowers in the spring, and a rich variety of sea and land birds and mammals. Its people range from the Inuit of the Canadian Arctic, Greenland and Alaska to the Lapps of Scandinavia and the Chukchi of Siberia.

'The Arctic World' offers an exciting visual journey through this immense land. The 130 color and black and white photographs, taken in each of the polar countries by renowned photographers, range from the breathtaking scenery to intimate portraits of people at work and at play. Those depicting traditional ways of life that have all but disappeared from the modern Arctic are important visual records of the unique heritage of northern peoples. Old engravings and early photographs of arctic explorers, whalers and native men and women provide a historical perspective.

The fascinating story of the adaptation of man, plants and animals to the arctic environment is told by six polar experts from around the world. They focus on the history of the Arctic from the ice ages to the present, the impact of the European exploration, the astonishing variety of the arctic flora and fauna, and the future of the Arctic in the face of twentieth-century technology.

'The Arctic World' is a unique, richly illustrated record of life, both past and present, in the far north, a land where nature knows no borders.