Your cart

Close

Total AUD

Checkout

Imprint

  • Hodder & Stoughton
  • Hodder & Stoughton
  • Hodder & Stoughton

Mad Dogs and Englishmen

Ranulph Fiennes

8 Reviews

Rated 0

Biography, Biography: general, Autobiography: general, Prose: non-fiction, Geographical discovery & exploration

Explorer and bestselling author Sir Ranulph Fiennes takes a journey around his vast and eccentric family tree, and reveals an amazing family history.

Discover Sir Ranulph Twistelton-Wykham-Fiennes s personal expedition to trace his extraordinary family through history. From Charlemagne himself a direct ancestor of the author to the count who very nearly persuaded William the Conqueror to retreat at Hastings, many members of this unique clan have lived close to the nerve centre of the ruler of their day. They number in their ranks a murderer, a wife poisoner, a poacher, England's greatest female traveller of the 17th century, and an extortionist Lord High Treasurer, teen cousins who eloped, a noble lord hanged for manslaughter, another hanged for adultery with the King's wife, and many who, as admirals or major-generals, won famous battles. The Fiennes behind Cromwell provided the castle in which the Parliamentarians made their first secret moves, the same building in which twenty-one successive generations of the family have lived for 600 unbroken years . . . And that is just a taster. Ranulph Fiennes tells the story of his unconventional, exceptional family, and reveals the ingredients for the man described by the Guinness Book of Records as 'the world s greatest living explorer'.

Read More Read Less

Praise for Mad Dogs and Englishmen

  • A whirlwind romp through the annals of time, peopled with the good, the bad and downright mad among the Fiennes clan. - Sunday Telegraph

  • Fascinating...it is some family tree - Adrian Chiles, The One Show

  • Praise for MAD, BAD AND DANGEROUS TO KNOW - -

  • If you ever struggle to drag yourself out of bed on a winter's morning, pick up a copy of Ranulph Fiennes' autobiography. It's an inspiration. - Mail on Sunday

  • Rip-roaringly readable - Guardian

  • Even readers with a broadly low tolerance for macho heroism will find themselves gripped . . . compelling - Time Out

  • This is the memoir of a supreme sportsman, an uber-earthling who could show the Martians a thing or two about what the best of us can achieve - Financial Times Magazine

  • "Ran' epitomises British phlegm, and he puts all other glory-seekers to shame. His dry wit, self deprecation and steely determination never to feel a scrap of self-pity are in the very best tradition of British travel writing. Long may he continue tomake us glad that we are not him, while we stand in awe. - Country Life

Read More Read Less

Ranulph Fiennes

Sir Ranulph Fiennes was the first man to reach both poles by surface travel and the first to cross the Antarctic Continent unsupported. In the 1960s he was removed from the SAS Regiment for misuse of explosives but, joining the army of the Sultan of Oman, received that country's Bravery Medal on active service in 1971. He is the only person yet to have been awarded two clasps to the Polar medal for both Antarctic and the Arctic regions. Fiennes has led over 30 expeditions including the first polar circumnavigation of the Earth, and in 2003 he ran seven marathons in seven days on seven continents in aid of the British Heart Foundation.

In 1993 Her Majesty the Queen awarded Fiennes the Order of the British Empire (OBE) because, on the way to breaking records, he has raised over A 14 million for charity. He was named Best Sportsman in the 2007 ITV Great Briton Awards and in 2009 he became the oldest Briton to reach the summit of Everest.

This website uses cookies. Using this website means you are okay with this but you can find out more and learn how to manage your cookie choices here.Close cookie policy overlay