A Hero for the Atomic Age

Axel Andersson is a Swedish historian and writer who has been fascinated by Heyerdahl and the Kon-Tiki since childhood. After attending school in Norway and graduating from the University of Edinburgh he completed his doctoral studies at the European University Institute, Florence, where he investigated the origins of the Kon-Tiki expedition and its abiding importance for the popular imagination. Andersson is also the author of Den koloniala simskolan (2016).

CONTENTS: The Man and the Myth – Making the Kon-Tiki – From Raft to Brand – The Seamless Craft of Writing Legend – To Review a Classic – The Kon-Tiki Film and the Return to Realism – A Lone Hero of Adventurous Science – White Primitives and the Art of Being Exotic to Oneself – The New Postwar Sea and the Pacific Frontier.

«This wonderful, original book offers a major contribution to the politics of race and racism, to the history of the Cold War and to the emergent field of Atlantic Studies.» (Professor Paul Gilroy, London School of Economics and Political Science)

«I can only say that I found this to be one of the more enlightening accounts of the history of 20th century science and exploration, thoroughly grounded in solid archival research, and contextualized in terms of the larger foment of social and political currents of the time.» (Patrick V. Kirch, Fornvännen (2012))